Fire Emblem the Self Insert Number A bajillion
by longherin
Summary: Nerdboy falls into Fire Emblem. Nerdboy uses SCIENCE (dubiously) to solve problems. And when I say Science, I mean the kind that invariably happen when you give magic to someone who watches anime. Takes small elements across all of Fire Emblem universe.
1. From - OH GOD THE SKY

I dream.

I dream that I am falling.

I dream that I am plastered against my bed, while staring down into the sky, holding on for dear life.

I dream that I somehow let go.

…

Wait.

Shit I'm actually not dreaming

FUUUUUCK

…

…

Ok, that woke me up. Thank goodness I wasn't higher up.

The impact still made me breathless.

Think later, float to surface now.

…

Floatation complete, assessing damage.

…

I'm ok, I'm definitely ok. No broken bones, just a body made entirely of aches and pains.

Where's the shoreline.

It's…that way.

Swim.

I wish I wasn't so exercise deprived.

…

_No point working yourself out to exhaustion, take it nice and easy._

Inner self is right. Take it slow.

_Battlecruiser operational._

...

Ok, shoreline reached.

Ugh.

Water tasted salty.

…

Salty?

I'm on a coastline somewhere?

Well shit.

It's also not night.

Double well shit.

It's…well it's about as spring as it is at home.

Uh…

Great.

…

Let's…walk. Yeah.

…

Man, and to think I enjoyed walking in a thunderstorm when I was little.  
Seriously, one minute I doze off reading webcomics and the next I'm walking down a dirt road dripping wet in the middle of god knows where.

…This sounds awfully familiar.

_Like Asleep._

Yeah.

…

Hope the guy keeps going. His work is good.

_Not like you can read it in…here…_

If we're drawing parallels I might actually be in the Fire Emblem-verse.

If only I was in the Fire Emblem girls universe instead.

_It would crash painfully on your head every time you open a map, unless you hit start to skip the sequence._

I don't have a start button, but I think it would still work.

_You would probably have become a girl in that universe._

…Yeah that might cause some problems.

…

Woo I found a house.

Well, a house attached to a farm, growing...something.

It looks…wow I'm actually getting a little nostalgic. It reminds me of my grandfather's house, only...smaller and less...white.

_Focus._

Let's see… ah ha, person sighted.

Alrighty then.

"Hello there!" No need to get totally antiquated now, do I?

_You're assuming they speak English instead of, say, Japanese._

I'm fucked either way, so who cares?

…

I don't have my glasses so I'm horribly shortsighted right now.

_So how did you know it was a person?_

Moving shape, odd mismatched colors, fairly tall.

…

Wow my eyesight has degraded since 8th grade.

_You're like double that age now._

Well, yeah, but still.

"Greetings to you, traveler. You look…waterlogged." She said, somewhat warily.

I laugh. It sounds forced, which it is. "I had a small incident on a boat." A small giggle from the lady. "Can I trouble you for some information?"

I hear a gruff voice behind me. "Oh, a traveler? What kind of information do you need?" Must be the husband.

"Well, where am I?"

Momentary silence.

"You're on the eastern border of Ylisse, young lad."

Eastern border?

So we're nowhere near Tutorial Town then.

Shit.

"Ah, I see. Uh…"

"Are you alright?" I think he's worried about me squinting like nuts.

"Yes, I seem to have lost my glasses." This could be really bad, especially since I don't have the means to pay for a new pair.

"Ah, I see…here, wait a moment."

…

And then he puts something into my hands.

"I'm not much of a magic person, but I found this in my house earlier today. Naga must look out for you." He laughs.

It's a pair of glasses. Built like my good ones, but…heavier.

Oh well. It means I can see clearly now.

_The rain is gone~_

"Why don't you come in for a while? The day's still young." I can see his…concern?

_You fell off a boat and had no idea where you were._

Ok, fair point; anyone sane would be worried.

"I really shouldn't; I need to be somewhere else, and being this far off course isn't going to help me." I bow my head. "I thank you for this gift and your hospitality, though."

He scratches his head. "It wasn't mine, and my wife's never seen it before. So it must be yours."

...Ah, the joys of being untainted by the internet.

I wave them goodbye.

In retrospect I have no idea where I'm going.

_Should've asked for a map._

…

…

…

Ah ha, a town.

Good timing, too. It's getting dark.

…

…

Well, I guess this means I hit my first roadblock. Number one, I have no money.

Number two, I have no idea where I am.

Number three, I have no idea if I could survive where I am.

…

Man, this is like, so bad it swings clear around to hilarity.

On the plus side I scored some free food from the church. It's just bread but better than nothing.

_But is it gluten-free?_

What is gluten, anyways?

Should've looked that up when I had a chance, I suppose.

…

…

_**BOOM.**_

…

That didn't sound normal.

Look up into the sky.

There're no giant glowing eyes of doom and apocalypse. Good.

So it means…

Shit, I need a vantage point.

Oh well, come out into the main streets from the side ones.

…There's a fire in the town.

There're multiple fires in the town.

Who the fuck sets fire to a town

I mean really

_Brigands, duh._

"Everyone! Hurry and put out the fires! Leave the bandits to us!" I hear…it sounds like…swivel head, peer.

…Yeeep. It's Stahl, in his green cavalier armor. Stahl plus some foot soldiers, probably local militia.

Still, Stahl was all the way out here during the prologue, I see.

Stay focused. Bandits are afoot.

Let's see…I can hear screaming, I'm guessing the bandits are a cause of it.

_You don't say._

Weapons, weapons…That's a pole. Spear. Good enough.

…

Laughter. Terrifying laughter. No voice actor can do that justice, my goodness.

Here they come!

The foot soldiers are…not bracing against the charge What the fuck are you guys doing

Dying. Dying is what they're doing. The first charge against the soldiers gave the brigands the advantage of momentum and the soldiers just couldn't make up the difference. Much screaming ensues.

These militia are not battle tested, obviously.

_You're not, either._

Point. Which means I'm probably going to die horribly.

Bandit saw me.

Adrenaline time.

The man is running…running…

Jumping…

Ok.

Step deep in forward, brace with shoulder.

Bandit jumps into the spear, and it promptly breaks into the man's ribs.

I was expecting it to be better. Shit.

Axe head overshot. Good.

Readjust the grip. I now have a shiv instead of a spear.

Left arm, back hand punch into bandit face.

Bandit recoils. I guess his surprise overrode his adrenaline?

Fine, continue the attack!

Wood shiv into the man's throat!

Woo, blood everywhere.

…

Shaking now.

Second guy coming in. How many of them were there? Twenty?

Pick up the axe the guy dropped, watch the enemy closely.

…He's swinging in sideways.

RUSH

FULL BODY TACKLE

Ok that axe hit, fuck. Not a full contact hit, but still, fuck.

Left arm is now non-responsive.

Spin on the spot with the axe, and…

My axe to your stomach!

Axe is now stuck, and the bandit is not down.

SHIT

Enemy axe

Backstep fast fast fast

Whew.

His swings are slower.

Second swing, coming from the right.

Step in hand-chop to the back of the enemy attack arm elbow. Uppercut on the elbow as well. He drops the axe.

Left arm elbow to the side of the ribs.

Left arm elbow again to the back of the head.

Right arm punch punch punch punch punch punch

Right to the stomach!

Coup de grace: Step out, left arm cross to the back of the head.

He's down.

Whew.

…

All the other bandits are dead.

I guess the militia was better than I gave them credit for.

…

Stahl's sword is bloody as hell; I guess he killed most of them.

Man is badass even before he gets twenty levels of strength, health and defense. Nice.

"Thanks for the help, man." Stahl breathes out. "Sumia was right on the money with this intel." He says as an afterthought.

So Sumia's trainee experience involves scouting...smart, if she's going to spend most of her time in the air.

"Darling," Ah fuck, Maribelle. "All the fires have been extinguished."

Maribelle, Maribelle…oh how I am mildly irritated by you. You and your parasol, and your uppity attitude.

"Who's this?" She says after she rides up on her high horse.

If the lighting was any better I would say she's looking at down at me.

"A traveler who's experienced some boat issues." I say with a slight bow. She's nobility, might as well play the part. God do I not like her.

"I see…" Sigh. Seriously, sigh. "You're quite…" I guess she's looking at the guy rolling on the ground, because punches from a skinny arm not aimed at a vital isn't really fatal. "…skilled, for a mere traveler."

Well…

I shrug. "I make do with what I have."

Stahl laughs. "Well, either way, the Shepherds thank you for your assistance towards Ylissean peace." Some cheers around.

Well...I know what the Shepherds are, but I'm a traveler, so...

"Shepherds?"

Maribelle sniffs. "We are the elite knight unit under direct command of the Prince of Ylisse, responsible for keeping the peace within our fair nation."

I want to strangle the woman. How does she sound so…arg, all the time?!

She sighs a little bit. "On behalf of the Shepherds, this is for you." She hands me a book.

Uh…

Wait.

Aaand she rides off.

"Come visit us if you're in Ylisstol in the future. The Shepherds could use a resourceful man like you." Stahl says as he rides off.

Resourceful? I broke a man's arm and punched him until he collapsed. I'm not sure how that fits with the definition of resourceful.

Speaking of the unconscious guy, the militia carried him off. I feel slightly sorry for him.

…

So what's this book?

…

I can't read it in the middle of the night. Right.

"Hey lad, got a place to stay for the night?" I hear a voice behind me.

It's…the innkeeper? All the NPCs look alike.

"I could certainly use one." I laugh a little bit.

He laughs harder, clapping me hard on the back. "Come with us then, it's on the house."

…

…

_Well, you killed a man today._

Yeah.

_Any feelings about it?_

After cleaning the blood off my hands…

No, not really; the man made his choice and paid for it. I mean, I'm still shaking, but...

_He could have had friends, family, and so on._

And he had no issues with endangering other people who also had friends, family, and children. His relatives are not responsible for his choices.

...

Sleepy time.

…

…

…

Beds in the pseudo medieval-era are pretty nice, I have to admit.

Then again I guess cotton hasn't changed all that much.

…

[Next day]

…

Now then, I have a map, from a bookseller that I apparently befriended somehow by punching a different man nearly to death.

Ylisstol is…that-a way.

…

Being a ground pounder sucks.

…

So what's this book Maribelle gave me?

…

It's…filled with geometric pictures.

I wish I had a calculator.

Well, I can do trig inside my head, but I'd rather have a calculator.

_First world problems._

So much.

"Oh my, now isn't this a surprise."

…

Right.

We're on a major road.

And people travel on major roads.

"I didn't know you were headed to Ylisstol, uh…" Stahl said, stopping short when he realized he didn't know my name.

Hmm…

Eh, why not.

"Ash, at your service." I say, complete with a little bow.

"Charmed, I'm sure." Man, if sarcasm could be bottled for money she'd be…well, richer than she is. "I am the lady Maribelle, pleased to make your, um, _acquaintance."_

Oh yeah, she's actually not totally pompous; only pompous most of the time.

"And I'm Stahl. Nice to meet ya." Stahl extends a hand from his horse, which I gladly shake because Stahl is a cool guy.

Also he's actually got a strong grip by virtue of actually doing manual labor.

_I didn't know fighting counted as manual labor._

Potato potatoe.

_Poor Dan Quayle._

Whatever happened to him nowadays anyways?

"Lady Maribelle," I say, with as much sarcasm I could slap onto a four letter word as I can. I don't think she got it since she sat up a tad straighter. "Mind telling me what this book is?"

Ha.

Right. She's big on diction, and I think I just failed, like, every last one of her checks.

But thankfully Stahl stole her thunder. "It's a book on basic magical theory she received back in town as a thanks for her healing."

Stahl earned himself two (light) bonks to the head during that sentence.

Maribelle tossed her hair, as a proper lady is bound to do. "I shall not touch combat magic until my Troubadour training is complete. You, on the other hand, seemed a perfectly reasonable recipient for this spell book."

So Fire Emblem spells are somehow based on trig.

_Still, might want to refrain from using it until you can get someone like…what's her name. To teach you._

Miriel.

_Yeah._

"So this spellbook doesn't actually cast, it's just a trainer?" I ask nobody in particular.

_Might want to start walking again._

Yeah.

…

…

"A small child gave this to me as a present, and it bears no use to me, a staff wielder. Thus, it is better served bringing knowledge to another." Maribelle said once I asked her why she's giving it to me. Seems oddly cold for her, since I know she has a heart thanks to her social supports…

"Don't question it." Stahl whispered. Well, fine. She's a little terrifying when angry.

…

Well, I guess I just encountered my second roadblock.

Everyone speaks English, but the written language is marginally different.

This is gonna suck really, really hard.

...

"It's not all that uncommon to be illiterate, mister adventurer." Maribelle says with a wide but oddly non-evil-looking grin. She just looks smug.

…

Wait, what?

_Remember that Fire Emblem is, at its core, still a semi-medieval era story. Literacy is reserved for the rich and ruling elites._

…

Since the majority of the main cast tend to be nobility it was never an issue, huh…

_It was in the Nino Merlinus support in seven._

Yeah, but otherwise the issue is more or less glossed over.

…

Which means non-religious based slavery, diseases, and all the other fun medieval things are a high reality.

"Oh, did I say something wrong?" I hear Maribelle say, a little taken aback.

I think my facial expression changed pretty hard if she sounds surprised.

…

_Well, let's take a moment and think about this. The presence of magic, especially restorative magic, implies that diseases are comparatively less of an issue in here than it is in the real world._

And at the same time the staff's 200 gold a pop. I don't see a lot of people wandering around with that much gold just lying around, unless they were the bad guys.

Yeah, the common man in Fire Emblem games have never been portrayed as being anything remotely close to being well off.

_Serfs at their finest, I see…_

…No point jumping to conclusions before I see anything.

"Are you done debating with yourself?" Stahl asked a little uncertainly.

I blink. "Yeah, I'm done. What gave it away?"

He chuckled. "You were muttering under your breath about the price of a restore staff and…serfs? Mind if I ask what a Serf is?"

Well, shit. Cat is…

Cat is out of the bag.

_Deploying emergency cardboard box._

"A term I once heard used for a poorly paid servant." I say with as much "I don't care" attitude as I can manage.

"Around here we call them peasants." Maribelle says almost instinctively before blinking in surprise. Well, she is a noble.

…

A horse comes up from in front of us, and it's…Sumia?

Let's see…yep, looks like Sumia. She's missing her Pegasus knight armor and is wearing something light and leather-looking in exchange, but it's definitely Sumia. So she's a Cavalier now?

_She's scouting, remember? She doesn't get her Pegasus until chapter 3._

Oh yeah.

…

Stahl and Maribelle waves goodbye and rides on ahead.

…

And I get to bury myself in the book until I walk into something.

Wonderful.

…

Ok, since I'm actually alone right now I can make some assessments.

Number one, it's the Fire Emblem universe; that much is obvious.

Number two, I've arrived at some time prior to the Prologue, considering how there wasn't bright glowing eyes of doom during the first night.

Number two point five, It's fair to say I've arrived quite a few days prior considering the difference in Sumia's equipment and locational differences, which means if I don't reach a walled town prior to giant glowing eyes of doom I stand a serious risk of being killed out in the open.

Number three, I'm wearing a set of local clothes as a reward and I got to trade the brigand axes for a spear.

_The odds of you using it in any serious fashion is literally zero._

Better than a sword, since I can't use it at all.

_You actually have some training with a sword though._

Number four: Magic is a thing, and odds are if I want to be alive I need to master it, learn it inside and out.

…

Number five: By being here I've changed the flow of the story already, the question depends on how much it's changed, with the worst case scenario being…

Number six: I have zero reason to believe that this is the default timeline instead of the one that leads down into the Future Past DLCs.

…

Well, shit.

And, of course, number seven, I'm still technically illiterate.

…

…

…

Y'know, I have to give props to the people who built their inns within one day walking distance of each other.

Makes things so much easier; probably get more business because of that, too.

_Those inns would probably be the first things to burn to the ground once the invasion begins._

Let's see...inside the inn is a handful of travellers, and sitting in the corner is a man in a pointy hat burying his face in a book.

Well, not my problem. A maid comes over and I order some food. Vegetarian fare, pretty decent.

…

…

Why do weird vapor zombie monsters enjoy setting things on fire, anyways?

_It's kind of a given for most things. Everything just suddenly catches on fire when bad things happen._

…

…

Speaking of catching on fire…

The invasion of the glowing eyes of doom is starting a little earlier than I thought, if the sudden change in lighting is any indication.

…

Shit, Asleep wasn't kidding. They're literally everyWHOA

Ground has fractured.

Get out of the building, now.

_How can you save yourself by running outside into zombies?_

"Everyone out of the building! MOVE!" I need something closer to an army.

…

Let's see…there's around ten people total, myself not included.

There were more during dinnertime.

…

Look up…wow, it's really, freakishly bright.

Not gonna lie, this is utterly terrifying.

Between the ground fracturing and the sky pooping out zombies, nerves are being lost left and right.

…

And the first zombies land.

…

We are so fucked, we are SO fucked.

"Grab whatever weapons you can find. We're getting out of here." I say to the others.

_Eyes up front, zombie incoming._

He's got an axe. Since he doesn't bleed, we'll just stab him until he goes down.

Side swing incoming, backpedal hard.

Swing misses, alright, step in, jab!

_Hit confirmed. Zombie gives no fucks._

Having no pain receptors will do that. It's a tougher than I gave it credit for, too; hitting the body feels like crashing into a few layers of leather. Pull spear out, and WHOA ok that was close.

_Having no pain receptors will let it do that._

"Don't let your guard down!" Mystery person behind me says, and the Zombie thing bursts into flames. The mage.

…Actually, that mage sounded rather familiar. Now's not the time to worry about it though.

…More Zombies.

God that's a lot of them.

"What in the name of the Gods is going on?" A man yells behind me. The Zombie Apocalypse is going on, pay attention. "What are those things?!"

Yeah, yeah.

"Yell later, focus now." I say to him. Good thing the Risen are actually pretty quiet at a distance.

_Which is a problem if you think about it._

Worry later, kill now. "Where's the nearest village?" I ask the gaggle of people.

"Down the road, that way." A man says behind me, pointing to the direction I travelled from. Figured as much.

I point to the other direction of the road. "Good, we're going in the opposite direction." More Risen, and looks like they noticed us.

The Risen as an individual is pretty ignorant of their surroundings, I guess? How do they hear or detect, anyways?

_Focus._

Right.

"What, why?! The village is safe!" The man yelled.

I shake my head and point to the Risen. The fact that we can easily see each other in the dead of night due to the glowing eyes in the sky is...utterly horrifying.

"We head to a village, we drag all of them with us. Think you can kill every last one of these bastards on the way there?" Silence. "Didn't think so. Form up, and get ready." We're all pole arm users, for some rather loose definitions of a pole arm. "If you can't stab, just whack them with the stick."

Some affirmatives. Well at least I'm being listened to.

"Oy, mage." I need his help.

"I'm here." He says. He sounds really familiar, not gonna lie.

"I need you to pick off every Risen we stop. Think you can do that?"

I hear a smirk. I think it was a smirk. "Something like that is well within my capabilities."

…Laurent? It might be Laurent. Small world if it is.

Risen are coming closer now. One or two is charging.

"Fight them as a group, don't get separated, and most of all, don't run; if you do you'll just be surrounded and cut down."

Mage behind me opens fire and burns a Risen to the ground. Three more are charging in.

The fire caught the attention of more Risen though, so we're against…what, twenty, thirty Risen? Sheesh.

…

The Risen are actually charging at me, aren't they?

Welp.

We're against…sword, sword, spear. Ok.

Jump out of the way, get nicked by a sword.

Ouchies.

I'm faced against…one of the swords, the other two went for the other folk.

Said other folk have spread out and are haphazardly trying to stab the Risen, while said Risen swing wildly at them in return.

My Risen is…jab DODGE to the RIGHT and OH MY GOD

Sword is so much harder to deal with than an axe. WHY THE FUCK IS THIS SO FAST

I WISH I PLAYED MORE DARK SOULS

AAAAAAH

UH

OK

NERDBOY DESPERATELY NEED HELP

_No help comes to someone YELLING in his MIND._

AAAAAAAAAH

…

…

He's been doing nothing but OH LORDY jabs for the past few hits and DODGE MORE

Ok

Ok

I can do this

Backpedal hard and keep the weight on the toes.

I'm so glad I don't have armor on now.

Risen is chasing.

God I hope they die to pierce damage.

Risen jab!

Spear forward, brace, aaaand…

_Thunk._

Wow. They're like…bad AI. Risen just impaled himself on the spear.

And vanished in a puff of smoke.

…

Was that a critical hit?

I hope it wasn't a crit.

We can kill them a lot easier if that wasn't a crit.

Second one incoming.

…

Lunge forward with spear.

_Thunk._

Another chest hit.

I guess all they have are basic motor skills?

_Or there's a cool down period for coming through the giant glowing eyes._

Said giant glowing eyes have vanished. Now all that's left are the light of the moon and the stars.

I wish we had a fire.

…

I can't believe I just wished for something to be on fire.

…

Look around...it sounds like the majority of the battle has finished.

We gather around again.

...

Mage ignites a small fire on the tip of his hand, we huddle around the tiny fire to prevent it from being seen and to give ourselves a little something to calm down with. Let's see...

We're short two bodies, and I can't tell how many Risen are left, but we killed all the ones attacking us and the rest aren't paying attention anymore. We had thirty, but if nobody's fighting anymore then we're left with zero?

Probably not. We're a fair distance from the two dead guys.

_I guess that means we abandoned them without even knowing it._

"Shit. Alright, let's get out of here." I say in a slightly-loud whisper. "Do we have any torches?"

"I got one here." One of the men says, tapping something on his belt. "Sure it's a good idea to light it right now?"

…

"Probably not. Keep together and let's move."

…

…

…

I can hear the shuffling of feet and breath, and very muted small talk between some people.

I really wish that nighttime in reality would be as bright as nighttime in Hollywood.

On the plus side I don't hear any Risen anymore.

_I'm a little confused as to why that's considered a plus._

…

Although to be fair this is a lot like being at my grandparents in my childhood, where the skies were clear enough to see the stars and not covered with a layer of whatever is floating up there now.

So it's bright enough to see shapes but not enough to see faces.

…

…

…

I raise a hand. I don't know how long it's been but no more small talk is going on.

All the footsteps stop, and I hear...

"Anybody else hear that?"

Sounds like combat.

"Yeah; sounds like cavalry. Not too far away from here." The mage said, pointing with his arm so we could see it to a direction off the road.

"Are we going to get involved?" One of the other men said with an unusual amount of indignation.

"We should; if the things they're fighting against wins they might catch up to us if we leave them alone." I shrug in the darkness. I don't think anyone saw that. "Besides, cavalrymen usually aren't poor like the rest of us."

I heard a few chuckles; nobody found that funny but we're a little bit terrified right now.

"Alright, lead the way." The mage nods (I think) and heads forward.

…

Yeah, definitely sounds like combat. If only because the Risen are being very loud about it. I can hear a horse every once in a while though.

_Who do you think have horses way out here and the combat power to fight?_

It would be our luck if it was...

…

Yep, it's Stahl.

Raise your hands if you're surprised.

He's guarding what looks to be a…

Ok who builds a shrine to a patron god this far off the beaten path? At least it's well lit, I guess…

_There're probably civilians in the shrine._

Makes sense; otherwise why protect it?

"Everyone form up, we're going to charge into the enemy ranks and take the pressure off of that horseman."

"You sure about that?" Is that the same guy? He sounds about as skeptical as the guy that was indignant. Same levels of "I don't want to do this" in their voices.

"You're free to leave if you want." I shrug. The "Go ahead and die on your own" I didn't say instead was palpable.

…

Alright, nose towards the Risen…and…

Move the feet!

...

_Fifty paces!_

LEEEEEROY

...

_Fourty paces!_

OH GOD THIS WAS A HORRIBLE IDEA WHY DID I EVER AGREE TO THIS

_YOU GAVE THE IDEA YOU IDIOT_

I DIDN'T THINK FAR ENOUGH AHEAD

_Thirty paces!_

…

Count of Risen: twenty or so.

Stahl is…yeah his horse is dead. No shit Sherlock, why were you mounted while protecting a stationary target?

Probably didn't have the time to dismount.

_Twenty Paces!_

How long was he fighting?

Where's Maribelle and Sumia?

…

No time to worry about that, making contact…

_NOW!_

_._

_._

_._

{ === + === }


	2. From - Outside a Shrine

COME ON

STOP. MOVING.

GAH

RISEN.

STOP BEING SO AGILE

QUIT. TRYING. TO. KILL.

STAHL GODDAMMIT

SO I CAN STAB YOUR HEART

ARG

_Having a little trouble there?_

Apparently Risen can only be killed through an attack to where its heart is. Anything else just plain will not work.

So either I crit or I do no damage, what is this bullshit?!

Apparently nobody else has scored a direct hit since all the damned Risen are still standing since five minutes ago.

_And the cherry on the top: they're not even paying attention to you._

HOW DARE YOU IGNORE MY ATTEMPTS AT ZOMBIE MURDERIZATION

Fine. Let's try something else.

Use spear's not-pointy end. Find a Risen…

And swipe at its legs!

It was not very effective...

_Did you forget you had skinny arms?_

Kinda, yeah.

Uh…well, shit.

...

Plan C. Take a step back and assess the situation.

Stahl is blocking the doorway to the shrine by himself with a sword and small kite shield. He's using the doorway as effectively as possible to force the Risen to attack at him one at a time. He's also stopped attacking for a while and has only parried, likely because after hacking off two or three limbs and seeing zero change in aggressiveness he figured buying time was more important. _Guess that means there might be a second entrance for people to escape to?_

God I hope not.

Better check. "You, over here." I say, pointing to one of the guys lagging in the back. Then again I stopped fighting entirely so I'm in no position to talk about enthusiasm.

"What, what is it?" He sounds terrified. Don't blame him.

"Circle around the shrine and check for any additional entrances. Make it fast." He…says something as he leaves. The Risen is too just too loud.

Ok, continue to monitor situation.

The militia is trying to kill the Risen, but since there are no clean hits to the core none of them actually died so far; the mage isn't using magic, for whatever reason (does magical fire burn?). And as a result the Risen is paying zero attention to any of us. This implies that Risen will only attack secondary targets if those targets actually succeed in dealing significant damage.

…

Come to think of it, the fact that the mage isn't attacking might be because he knew this about the Risen. It's not like we're organized by any stretch of the imagination…

I'm now willing to bet money he's Laurent.

…

Ok, we need to get organized. It's probably idiotic to assume the Risen will pay zero attention to us forever.

…

Yeah. Yeah. Shit. One of them just got stabbed in the head and now all of them (except the ones that are closest to Stahl) have turned around.

We're outnumbered two to one and…morale. FUCK_._

One of the Risen just swung around with his axe out and cut down one of the guys. And now everyone's backed off a handful of steps.

While the Risen advances forward slowly.

…

Aaand now everyone has run away. Some running away screaming and taking a few Risen with them.

_I'm not remotely surprised._

Risk your life for someone you've never met. What could possibly go wrong?

_Maybe it's because you're not a girl?_

So now it's…what, three against twenty?

Oh well.

_You seem oddly calm._

I seem to have gone so far into terror I broke the limit and swung straight back into tranquility.

Anyways…step back, stay near the shrine, and watch for the ones that get a little ballsy.

Speaking of ballsy, hello number one.

Plant the heels, raise spear, brace, and…

Wow, they practically aim for the spear with their center, like some…I dunno, deranged zombie masochist?

_That comparison makes no sense._

…

Flash of red to my side. The mage has finally opened up with fires. And he's…aiming straight for their center. The man definitely knows what he's doing.

Need to keep the Risen from getting smart and just rushing me down, so walk nice and steady…

Ballsy number two.

And three.

Shit.

Backpedal. They're all sword or axe users. Huh. Interesting.

Whoa that was close

…

And now they're all running at me.

FUCK

I am screwed

So screwed

"To me!" I think hear someone yell. I see a puff of fire. I think it was the mage yelling.

I'm gonna believe it was the mage yelling. Can't hear a thing over the Risen's...whatever speech they're doing.

Welp. Run like hell to him.

…

Y'know, I don't know why anyone would look behind them in a movie where they're being chased, especially when it's dark and you can hear the massive amounts of footsteps.

_I'm sure they're about to jump on you at any moment. See? one of them's coming after you with its sword already raised over its head, ready to strike as soon as you slow down..._

…

And I just tried to look behind me.

_Hehehehe_

Imagination is a bitch sometimes.

**WOOSH**

A ball of fire just flew by my head. Followed by another, and another, and another…This guy is damn good.

And he's hitting the center every time, if the sound of something heavy hitting the ground every time he shoots is any indication.

_Throw dots, more dots, more dots. Ok stop throwing dots._

Now's not the time, brain. Also I don't want him to stop throwing d-FIRE. fire.

…

The mage has a Risen behind him.

Fuck.

"Behind you!" I yell.

The mage doesn't even turn around; he just blasts the area behind him with a very wide area-of-effect fire spell. And then continues to shoot the ones behind me. Pretty sure there's like, two left.

…

…

Final tally: Me: two. Mystery mage: everyone else. Magic OP, please never nerf.

_Stahl?_

Shit. Stahl.

Look to the shrine entrance, lit up by a torch, and…

He's ok. Whew.

He looks a bit not-ok though, but he's alive and has all of his body parts attached.

…

"Might as well bring that torch out now." I say to the mage, who does this head nod and head tilt combined expression that feels like "sure, why not?" and brings out his torch, and lights it up.

...Wow that's a lot of Risen body parts littered near the entrance.

_I guess that was why you were ignored? Stahl just drew so much aggro?_

I don't think reality works like that, but either way he's done so much damage before we got here we were literally just mopping up.

...

Come to think of it, I wasn't paying attention to the limbs of the Risen at all, but it did feel as if a lot of them had missing arms.

And now those arms limbs on the ground vanish in a puff of smoke.

So how many did he kill or dismember before we got here?

...

"Thanks for the help. Oh, you're that traveler from earlier." Stahl says, breathing pretty hard. His sword is quite a bit shorter than it was than when we got here and the shield is in tatters, with only the metal parts intact. It's too dark to see what's really going on though. "Right; get in, we're going to barricade the entrance until the sun comes up; it's too dangerous to move during the night anyways."

I nod, and then remember that it's still the night. "Got it."

So we move some boxes to the entrance under the proviso that if they're disturbed we would know about it, since we don't have nails or planks.

This is the worst barricade I've ever seen. At least some of the boxes are stacked to go up to your knees, which is nice.

…

As we enter the main room, and…torchlight says there's no other entrances.

Which reminds me.

_The other guy ran away too, probably._

Sigh. The muttering he did was most likely colorful and very disagreeable.

In the shrine is…a mix of, oh, maybe thirty villagers? Mostly women and children; Maribelle is tending to the wounded without her staff in sight (largely just cleaning and bandaging wounds) and Sumia is...tending to some of the children.

_Who will probably be orphans before the week ends._

Nothing we can do about it.

...

Maribelle looks ragged, must be due to a lack of a frilly dress in favor of...a nightgown with a coat over it, and not having time to do her hair.

Sumia's in her leather scout armor thing that makes her look like the common soldier, except with no metal parts...can't really see from here though.

And Stahl...well, Stahl looks like hell. his armor is badly dented almost everywhere, and sections of it along the outer edges is outright missing. Good thing the Risen don't really bleed or his armor would be utterly unrecognizable.

...

Stahl sits next to a wall, tosses his equipment to the side, and lets out a huge sigh. I sit next to him.

His body heat is like, radiating. How long has the man been fighting?

"There seems to be a lack of men around here." I mutter to him.

"We didn't have the time." Stahl said bitterly. Got the women and children out first, I see.

_Only got the women and children out, more like._

"What happened to you guys, then?" I couldn't help but ask.

Stahl shakes his head, and…

Then he's asleep while sitting down. Alright then, the man probably deserves a lot of it.

I move away from him, since he needs his sleep.

Maribelle has no staff, and Sumia had no…whatever weapon she uses as a scout. Probably a spear, since she uses it later. Going by the logic that they probably have been fighting and travelling for…well, longer than I have, their weapons were probably broken long before they got here.

"Oh, it's…Ash, isn't it? Hello." Sumia says, as she gets the little kids to sleep (though it's probably just exhaustion overcoming their fear) and comes over to me, the newcomer.

I had to take a moment to parse the fact that I used a pseudonym.

"Yeah, and you're…Sumia, right?" She…I dunno, I guess she nodded since I heard something move, the lighting here is far from perfect. The mage had moved the torch to Maribelle and she's on the other side of the room.

"Uh-huh. How do you feel?" Sumia sounds like her japanese voice actor.

"A little shaken." Adrenaline is wearing off, and I'm actually shaking a lot, if my voice is any indication. I take a deep breath. "But otherwise alright. How about…well, all of you? What happened?"

She sighs. "We were at the next village over" which meant we were heading to a graveyard, wonderful. "when those things dropped out of the sky. Stahl rallied the local militia and they fought until overwhelmed to keep an escape path open, but in the end, well...those things were impossible to kill." Which might be why Stahl was chopping off limbs instead of trying to go for a heart or head hit.

"After that, we travelled here and…well, then more of them showed up." Can't help but feel as if she's skipping something, but oh well.

…

Oh, that's the end of her story. Uh…

"What happened to the militia?"

"We agreed to split the refugees up to avoid drawing attention."

…

Well, it makes some sense, but in the night?

Fucking death sentence.

"Well, shit." I mutter under my breath.

"You should get some sleep, Ash. You don't look too well." Sumia says.

She says I don't look well, which is probably true, and then she...

Is in the processing of passing out. Actually passed out.

Considering the circumstances I'd wish they could get some sleep outside of the uncomfortable armor.

_You know…_

No.

_Here are some of the things you can do to her in her sleep._

INTERNET THOUGHTS! BEGONE! FOUL IMAGINATION!

_I guess you're right. Good night._

Wait what

…

…

...

…

"Hey, you ok over there?"

What

What am I doing

My face is cold and stony and my glasses are pressed into my face

"Hey, sleepy head." It's a small girl's voice. "Wake up."

Uh…

Where am I?

There's a small girl giggling over my head.

And I'm on the ground.

And it's loud, well, a sort of hushed loudness. A lot of things are happening but nobody's really talking.

_Slept well?_

Nope. Right side of body is complaining about sleeping on the stone floor.

I sit up.

"Yay, you're up!" Says the cheerful little girl.

"Yeah. Thanks, little lady." I get up, and stretch, and the girl runs over to…her mother I suppose, and Maribelle.

She's a little difficult to recognize with her hair in a mess like that instead of the curls.

_Remember what happened?_

Um. I was talking to Sumia, then she clocked out, and then…

My brain exposed itself to the internets and then proceeded to run out of juice.

Judging by the fact that my face is still intact I guess I blanked out against the wall and then slid onto the floor.

_Here's all the things you could've done to Sumia a few hours ago._

EVICT the bad THOUGHTS from my HEAD by YELLING in my HEAD

…

...

Stretching finished. Let's see…the door's that way...the barricade was undisturbed. Wow, that's pretty impressive, considering that it was literally a very easily surmountable ankle-high fence. I guess the lack of sound from the shrine after the battle helped? Vapor Zombie sensory inputs confuse me.

_This means the Risen are blind, as far as their fallen comrades are concerned._

Not necessarily. Especially if the Risen…let's step outside for a moment…yeah, the Risen corpses vanished. Damn.

_You could've dissected one of them._

Yeah, I really should have. Oh well, plenty of chances in the future.

_Do they have a taboo against dissection here?_

Probably not against the undead.

"Oh, you're up. How was your rest?" Stahl…looks disheveled as hell, but still cheerful. It doesn't feel forced either, which is...either very good acting on his part or he's just that optimistic. Standing outside in the morning light, his armor is so seriously damaged I'm surprised it's holding together.

"Considering the circumstances, the best sleep I've ever had." I'm not even sure how long I slept. I want a watch.

Maribelle walks over in a huff. "Sir Stahl," Sir? "Perhaps we should hurry." Wow, that stare. What the hell did I do to her?

_Here's what you could've_

NO

"Ah, yeah, you're right." There're no horses in sight (except the dead one that used to belong to Stahl that's been moved to one of the back walls of the shrine). "We need to get out of here before more of those things show up; can you move?"

…

What happened to the mage? I don't see his pointy hat anywhere.

"Ash?" What? Oh.

I nod. "Yeah, I'm good to go." And then I look at the spear in my hand. "Does anyone of you want this?"

Maribelle raises an eyebrow, but doesn't say anything.

"I figured a trained soldier would use a weapon better than me." I shrug, and then offer the spear to Stahl.

He sheepishly takes it. "I'm not sure if I'll be better than you while on foot, but thank you."

I really wish the mage who may or may not be Laurent stayed around.

…

"So how far is Y-uh, where we're going from here?" Almost forgot I'm a stranger and supposed to have no idea where we're going.

"We're heading to Ylisstol by cutting through this forest. It'll take a little while but it probably will be safer than walking on a main road." Sumia said; she can't really scout while on foot so she's walking along with everyone else.

Her clumsiness is also a bit overblown, as she's only tripped once every five minutes without a serious fall.

_Or maybe her clumsiness is inversely proportional to the smoothness of the floor?_

I wouldn't be surprised if that's how it goes.

…

Maribelle what are you doing

_She's gathering plants, some flowers, and some other stuff._

Well, yeah, but that doesn't really explain what she's doing.

_Maybe you should just ask her._

Hell no. I do badly enough around normal, well-adjusted women.

_Since when are you normal? Go after the odds ones._

Fair point, but still. She scares me.

_Here're some scenarios that could happen_

NO GODDAMMIT

…

…

Midday, we're breaking for…food? I guess this is one of the reasons Stahl chose to cut through the forest; there are small bunches of fruit trees that I'm assuming are safe to eat.

"Have to thank Chrom later." I heard Stahl mutter. Well, even as a stranger I should be privy to gossip, so I should know who Chrom is.

"What did he do?" I ask.

"He pulled some weight to get fruit trees and other food bearing trees and shrubs scattered through Ylisse. It makes marches easier." Stahl bites into a fruit. "Well, it was probably Fredrick's idea, but it's the best idea they ever had."

It certainly makes a small group like the shepherds move around easier.

"I'm surprised you know the name of our prince." Maribelle says lightly. Why does everything she say sound mildly insulting?

"His...lack of finesse is fairly well known." I shrug, after spending slightly too long to find a way to word it.

Fortunately Maribelle dislikes me enough already that I don't think she thought too much of it.

She also carries a dedicated fruit knife.

_Here's what she can do with that knife_

Let's not go there

_Too late_

...

Wait, what...

Yeah.

Stahl just grabbed the spear. My ears weren't playing tricks; the civilians have all stopped talking, even in hushed tones.

I'm reminded of cats all of a sudden, when they're surprised by a loud noise and just freeze. Or most small animals in that case.

"Sumia, over there." Maribelle said, pointing to a direction to her…left? Her left, my right, towards a bunch of trees. While continuing to carve the fruit with her knife. She's really good with that knife, which is terrifying for various reasons

_focus_

Stahl drew his spear and motioned for all the civilians to get down lower, which they try to do.

Sumia nods and…wow she's really fast on the ground.

Very surprised, and very impressed. So why is she trip-happy?

"Darling." I think she only uses that term when she's trying to be derisive I swear "can you fight without weapons?"

"I'll manage." I shrug. Maribelle looks…unconvinced, to put it lightly.

"Well, don't die; it won't be good for morale."

Stop waving the knife in my face please

…

Five minutes pass, and there's Sumia, coming back from her scouting mission.

"More of those things," She said in a semi-whisper. "There's three of them, but it doesn't look like they're doing anything."

Stahl got up. "If we leave them alone they might come after us in the night; I'll be back in a few minutes."

You're not fighting them alone. I get up. "I'm going along."

Stahl looks…well, not very convinced.

I shrug. "You need someone to watch your back; no discussions, let's get this over with."

He shakes his head. "Well, it's your choice."

Sumia opens her mouth, and Stahl cuts her off. "Stay with the group; we don't know if they're the only ones here."

She nods and goes to sit with Maribelle.

…

There're not a whole lot of trees here, let's see…yeah, three Risen. Armed with…nothing, since they are Revenants.

_So we're looking at super sharp claws of pain and sadness._

Wonderful. On the other hand, no reach advantage for them anymore.

"So, how're we doing this?" Stahl asks. Why ask me?

"Let them come to us." I say as loudly as I can without shouting.

The Risen immediately snaps to attention and wow their eyes are red as shit.

_No clear eyes in the smoke zombie afterlife._

Must be horrible.

They're charging without a care in the world, huh…

_Aren't they supposed to have horrible hearing?_

Guess it's a case by case thing, but more importantly right now,

"Go for center of mass hits." I say, and back up to use a tree as cover, dragging my feet on the ground for the louder noise.

The Risen break off…one on Stahl, two on me. Good. Might not be good for my health, but good overall.

Stahl braces with his spear and the Risen…impales itself onto the spear, but it wasn't a direct center hit, so now Stahl has a live Risen skewered on his spear trying to rip his face off. So he bodily tackles the Risen to free it from his spear and then stabs it harder on a shoulder, trying to make the claws less of a problem.

_Focus._

One Risen had ran straight into the tree since it was jostling for position with the other one and lost. The second one is charging with his hands over his head.

_Did you think about how you're going to actually kill it?_

Nope.

Overhead swing incoming, crouch and dive forward into its legs.

Ow. Vapor zombie legs ending in goo are oddly solid, all appearances aside. My shoulder hurts now.

It has tripped over my body though, which is good.

It has landed face down behind me, which is better.

…

It is now beginning to slime into the ground. Which is bad.

_You don't say._

Ok, decision time.

…

FULL POWER KICK TO THE HEART

OH THAT…didn't hurt…at all? What?

Nevermind a ribcage or anything, but it should, like, stand up to a single physical hit at least.

Debate later, devastate now. STOMP AGAIN

FUCK OK that actually hurt because my foot made contact with the ground. The Risen vanished almost immediately.

That being said I actually did kill it though…well, I can ask Miriel later, I guess.

Second guy has…untangled himself from the tree (How the hell did he get tangled to begin with? Risen aren't utterly stupid) and is…side swiping. Back away really really fast.

…Oh. I guess the fact that it almost cut a tree down in a single swing might explain why it was lodged in a tree.

Still, it's lodged in a tree with its back towards me. Don't mind me as I capitalize on your failures.

Though I could do without the 180 degree head turn.

Punch to the Risen's back!

…

And again, no resistance. It feels like…I stuck my hand in smoke. It's weird.

Found something warm. Uh…

_Quick Time Event! _

Crush Weird Warm Center Mass in hand.

…

Again, no resistance. The Risen vaporizes, leaving the gigantic claw marks on the tree.

Y'know, this means I might be able to insta-kill Risen on touch.

_Feel like trying it out on every Risen you meet?_

…No, not really.

…

Stahl.

…

Wow, Stahl pinned the Risen to a tree with the spear via its neck and is actually punching the shit out of the Risen. On the head. Repeatedly.

If his enemy wasn't a weird vapor zombie thing this would actually be bullying.

…

After about (another?) twenty or thirty punches the head comes clean off, and then the headless Risen vaporizes.

Stahl pulls the spear out of the tree.

I clap, because honestly that was the most badass thing I've seen so far.

Stahl twists around and whoa that is a murderous expression if I've ever seen one. He then goes back to his normal face.

I...I guess the eternal laid-back average guy has his moments, too.

"Don't tell anyone about that." He mutters.

I nod, because I don't fancy what would happen if I was on the receiving end of serious!Stahl.

…

"We're clear; the Risen have been taken care of." Stahl says after we wander back to the group. I think we've been gone for like fifteen minutes or so.

Maribelle nods and waves for everyone to get going again.

…

Stahl and I are on the front of the pack this time, Sumia a bit further ahead since she has better eyes (makes sense, being a flyer and all) and Maribelle in the center of the civilian group, talking with the people like a normal, well-bred, and most importantly a warm person.

I think I'm dreaming. Although the lack of the noblewoman equipment probably helps with the whole mingling thing.

"How did you kill those things back there with just your bare hands?" Stahl asked. "We could only hurt them with our weapons, and only under extreme circumstances." Like when you punch it until the head comes off.

"I'm not sure; but when I went for its center there wasn't any resistance." Which is the truth; I have no idea what's going on.

"Sounds useful." Stahl muses.

I shake my head. "Imagine trying to punch one of them that actually have armor." The armor from the armed Risen stays around after the Risen vanishes but they disintegrate extremely quickly.

Stahl sighs. "Oh yeah. I was kind of hoping we had a secret weapon around." He grins.

Me too, Stahl. "Me too."

…

…

As the second day march ended…

I realized just how quickly morale dropped once the sun started to set.

We can't build fires for fear of both burning down the forest and drawing the Risen to us, so the little kids that were in relatively high spirits during the daylight just cowers into their mother's arms.

Hell, I think we're all a little bit scared here. Except me; I'm actually terrified.

Oh, and we're taking a detour. Apparently the woods thin out a bit to make room for a small farm. Not quite sure who owns it but the general consensus is whoever used to own it is probably dead. So Sumia, being the one with the eyes and the scout training, opted to go ahead and see if there's anything to use while we make our way ahead in the darkness.

Yes, thanks to Maribelle we opted to continue moving while hungry and exhausted in the dark in the forest canopy.

_You seem to be very against the idea._

Yes.

_And yet you're still going along with it._

Because the forest at night populated with zombies and zero light is worse.

I wish it was winter, or at least really early spring. Or late fall.

Really, any amount of time where the canopy doesn't block out the moon.

…

On the plus side we've

_Don't say it._

Right. (Haven't seen a Risen all day)

…

Oh hey, everything just lit up like the fucking day.

_You just HAD to think it, didn't you._

I had to complete the sentence!

The skies are, once again, filling with glowing eyes of zombie teardrops. On the plus side there seems to be marginally less than last night.

"Use the light." I say suddenly, making everyone jump. "Move, quickly, while we can see."

I see Stahl nod. "Yeah. Please hurry, everyone."

And so we double time it.

…

Why are our feet so loud?

Why are the leaves so loud?

…

We're running faster and faster.

The fear is really getting to us.

_Pace everyone._

Yeah.

I drop my pace a little, and refuse to go any faster. Maribelle catches up, glances at me, and her eyes widen just a tiny bit.

And then she drops her speed to match mine.

…

Eventually everyone's moving at the same speed, not getting faster any more.

Fear, for a brief moment, is replaced by order.

Breathing gets easier, the running gets easier...

…

…

Until one of the Risen plops like right in front of us.

I mean seriously canopy, you're not doing a good job.

Keep the fucking zombie from raining on our heads please?

…

The center is in its upper chest, lung area...left? or so this time.

Ok then. Before it has a chance to collect itself…

Sprint!

_Risen has stood up, his axe is now going over his head…_

But I'm right here in front of you and my hand is going into your throat.

_If it was any more solid this would be utterly disgusting._

I look like I'm reaching into a jar that's taller than I am. Only, y'know, it's alive, gurgling, and very much unhappy with the sudden intrusion.

Found the center.

CRUSH.

Ooh, I have to admit, I'm channeling a little Persona Four and it feels GOOD.

…

"How did you know where its heart is?" Maribelle asks after we continued in a few moments of silence. I did note that the space around me is eerily empty all of a sudden, though.

_It's almost like reaching into a zombie to crush its soul (or whatever) isn't conducive to making friends_.

"It just felt…right, I guess?" I'm not entirely sure myself. "I wanted to ask a mage about it, but, well."

Maribelle looks rather offended. "I happen to be educated in the magical arts, why didn't you ask me?"

Uh…because you're terrifying? "I figured a question like that would be more suited to someone practicing magical combat."

She makes a weird noise I barely catch. "Quite astute of you."

Now I wonder what would've happened had I actually asked her.

…

No more Risen showed up around us (or at least harassed us) for the rest of the night, thank god.

And we've hit the edge of the trees, so the farm buildings are in plain sight.

_I hope Sumia's alright._

Dying offscreen sucks.

…

While we would like to keep the children away from the blood and gore, the ultimate feeling was that we're in no position to be separating right now, considering the grave lack of energy of everyone involved.

Hell, my right eye has all but shut down at this point: there's a giant blind spot in my right eye in low light, which is generally what happens when my body declares that it is now no longer capable of functioning in the dark.

Considering I've been exercising all night (more or less) this is like, five times the energy I'd normally use, and—

_Oy._

Right. Mind wandering.

Stahl and I take the lead.

…

And we arrive on the farm, which is…

Uh.

Really clean. There's no sign of a struggle at all.

This is both good and bad.

Good because at least Sumia would be unhurt.

Bad because she might not actually be here.

I feel a tap on my shoulder, and look at Stahl pointing to…the main farm house door slightly open.

With blood trails illuminated by the light coming from the inside.

…

…

…

This is not good, on so many fucking levels.

The three of us charge into the house without even a second thought, and see…

Blood on the ground, trails of it, not splatters, which is very, very good.

And Sumia, who looks like…

"Move it." Maribelle pushes me out of the way and brings out her staff, immediately bathing Sumia in the healing light.

Her armor looks like it was cut and burned in many, many places. They seemed to have avoided her face and head, fortunately.

_Which means…_

That they were…let's just...leave Maribelle to her work for a second and look around.

Yeah. Let's do that.

_Dodging the question doesn't make it any less real._

…

The room is fairly normal: a cabinet, some crates, some smashed crates, and a bed, and...

An odd looking wall.

"Ash?" Stahl asks as I walk over to the odd looking wall and push it.

Nothing.

Push harder.

A rattle, but the wall didn't give, so…let's try running into it.

…

Ow. But it opened, and…whoa.

It's an armory.

"This is an odd farmer." Stahl mutters while looking over the stashes of swords, spears, bows, and arrows just lying around. Also a few stacks of bucklers.

I, on the other hand, see the large cloth with six eyes emblazoned on it hung on the wall like a banner.

Well it's a good thing I played the game or I would have absolutely no reason to believe in any kind of foreshadowing whatsoever.

_To be fair you'd see it as foreshadowing even if you knew nothing about the game. Want to tell everyone about it?_

That there's a terrorist group operating in Ylisse? Except...

No reason to believe the Grimleal are huge now though; they only show up as a serious plot element after the two year time skip.

"They have a weird taste in decoration though." I say, pointing to the cloth.

I am now so tired I don't want to get up from the door I rammed down with my entire body.

Stahl looks at me, lying down on the ground, and then looks up at the cloth. "Indeed." He then goes around and starts reequipping himself.

Well, I guess I should peel myself off of the comfortable door I'm falling asleep on.

And get some gear of my own. Let's see…I don't know how to use any of this shit, but a sword that goes on my waist, two knives that go on my belt, arrows on my back, and a bow, also on my back.

"Do you know how to use any of that?" Stahl asks after I finish strapping in the gear, also taking some vulneraries and putting it in a second belt I found.

_You're like a belt away from becoming a final fantasy character._

Pssh. I'm more like fifteen belts, three zippers and a tragic past away. Also I would need more bishonen-ness.

"Not a clue, but it'll be better than not having it." My only regret is that there's no armor, but it's not like it'll help all that much right now anyways.

…

"How's Sumia?" I ask, after getting enough courage to step out of the safety of the armory.

_I think Stahl was in there for the same reason as you were, mind you._

Maribelle sighs after…packing up the bunch of plants she picked along the way, along with her staff. "There's no danger to her life, fortunately, but I don't think she'll be moving for a few days." She then made like a tsk noise. "I believe the prior owners of this _farm_ were illegal slave traders; the world has just gone insane and they're still focused on money, those morons."

I think she dropped her noble-speak for a moment.

But Sumia is…

"So there's no lasting damage?"

Maribelle shrugs, very un-ladylike. "Can't say for the moment; at least her enemies tried to keep their prey in one piece." She then stretched, got up, walked over to the bed, and collapsed into it. "Don't wake me up."

Uh…

Stahl shakes his head to ward off the sleep. "Let's take a look outside. Maybe there's something else in the farm area."

I nod, and we leave the house, taking care to close the door behind us. Considering the bloodstain still leading out of the house I don't think anyone would want to go in, which is nice, since I think if Maribelle is disturbed in her sleep she would, y'know, kill all of us.

...

Well, we're at the other building, the…barn. It's not big and red but it's a barn.

_You probably shouldn't try to describe things while exhausted._

Good call.

Looking inside…wow that is a shitton of wagons. Well, I can only see three, but I'm assuming there's more.

But we have no horses, so the wagons are totally use…less? Maybe they do have horses elsewhere?

I pose that question to Stahl while he's examining the wagons. He nods. "Can you take a look around the barn, then?"

I nod affirmative and go off on a jogging pace.

…

There's a stable on the further side of the barn, and judging by the look of it…

Quite a few horses were cut loose in a big hurry, but there are…three horses left? I'm not sure if they can pull enough carts to handle thirty people or so.

That being said some of them are children, so…

_Except that one of the three people who knows how to handle a horse is out of comission._

Ok, that's a bit of an issue, especially since we need to get to Ylisstol as fast as we can; not meeting Chrom and, more importantly, Robin, is a huge issue. I can't backseat game if I don't know what's going on, after all.

Well, in any case…

"Stahl, there're three horses left. Do you think they can handle three wagons of people?"

"As long as we stick to the main roads it shouldn't be an issue; do you know how to control a horse?"

"Not at all."

Stahl sighs. "Well, that's somewhat inconvenient…let's get the horses over here first, then. Can you go wake up the girls?" WHAT "…later?" He adds after seeing my face.

_WARNING. WARNING._

"Uh…sure. I guess."

_MINEFIELD INCOMING_

…

Y'know, the fact that my body is generation an insane flight response right now concerning waking up Maribelle—while helping Stahl with the horses—is very much telling of how much more dangerous she is compared to the Risen.

At least I know I have an unexplained ace in the hole against those things.

_So how do you plan to wake her up without committing a felony?_

Uh…two options, really. Loud noise or physical contact, like that one poster with the penguin and the bear.

_That second method seems a little suspect._

I get killed by everyone if I try the first (and it might not even work)...

Or I just get killed by Maribelle if I try the second.

_Or you could stand behind her and turn your creep-meter to the max._

If I knew how to do that I would, but considering how tired we all are I don't think something like that would work.

_Project an aura of killing intent?_

I _dislike _Maribelle, I don't want to _kill _her.

_Not even fake wanting her dead?_

I don't think I can fake killing intent. How does that stuff work anyways?

"Ash." Stahl says. I think he caught the many, many looks cycling very quickly on my face, a majority of them somewhat related to either fear or abject terror. "Take a nap; you don't have to wake her up right now."

So…Stahl knows how dangerous she is when she's being woken up?

"How bad is she when she gets up in the morning?" I can't help but ask.

Stahl twitched. Talk about not good signs. "Well, uh, her mood gets worse if her sleeping arrangements are 'unfitting for a lady', as she puts it."

That's a very, very polite way to say "you are totally and utterly fucked" Stahl.

_Better you than him._

SIGH. So much sigh. I should probably take the knife from her first, just in case.

_I don't think she actually wants to taste your blood on her precious knife._

My blood is less valuable than her fruit, I suppose.

…

You know what, I don't care right now. The wagon looks really enticing, so I'm going to sleep there.

"Uh, good night?" Stahl says after I climb into the wagon and just lie down.

_Here's a—oh, you're asleep already._

.

.

.

{ === + === }


	3. From - A Cart

Uuuuugh…

What's all that noise?

Why does my face hurt?

…

Uh…

I'm…

Oh, right. I passed out in a cart.

…

It's really damn loud outside.

…

There's a shitton of screaming outside.

SHIT

Get up, weapons…Everything I got is on me. Ok. Good. Move move move!

Jump off cart

Out the doors

Oh lordy that's bright

Blink. Blink some more.

Ok.

…Yeah.

Shit.

…

Risen found us some time during the day.

Where…where is everyone?

Ok, calm down, look around, avoid tunnel vision.

…

There are some corpses on the ground, mostly civilians but a few Risen. The currently alive Risen are swarming around the building, focusing on the door. Given the fact that they can't get in the door has probably been barricaded, much like the Shrine.

Once more, shit. How I wish this was a movie.

…

Stahl. Where is Stahl?

_There's no one outside here that's flesh and blood except you, but on the other hand Stahl's green armor is nowhere to be seen._

So he's probably guarding the rest of the civilians inside the house.

…

There's…maybe thirty, fourty Risen. All focused on the door. Jesus.

Can I have a map with less enemies please?

_It's because there's thirty or fourty Risen that the rest of the civilians are still alive: the Risen are crowding around the door, getting in each other's way in their drive to chew on Stahl._

Let's…circle around the house. There might be something I can find that'll help in a moronic situation like this…

…Ah ha. A window. Good thing Risen are really dedicated to murdering via the door.

_There's something wrong with that sentence._

Knock.

…

"Who…Ash?" I hear…Sumia.

"Yeah, it's me. When did they get here?"

"Some while ago." I'm not sure what I was expecting, given the lack of clocks. "I only heard them when they attacked."

Which means they caught us flat-footed. Damn.

"How many other people are in there with you?" I ask her. Need to move fast.

"Stahl, me, and maybe fifteen people. Stahl's holding the door for now, but…"

Hmm…

_Small, enclosed entrance, plenty of arms, people…I think we should play some total war._

Yeah.

"Sumia, can you get everyone who can to grab the longest spears they can find?"

"What? Why?" Right, I'm a nobody; almost forgot about that.

"Just…do it, we don't have that much time." If I yell, I lose cred. If I yell, I lose cred…

"Uh, right."

I hear her talking to the people inside, then some movement, and then…

"Ok, they're armed, now what?"

"Make a line circling the door, spears out. Take care not to poke Stahl." Most movement.

"There's not enough room for everyone to fit." Sumia sounds worried. Stahl might not be holding out much longer.

"That's fine. Ok, get Stahl to back up a little, give them a little room to come in."

"That's insane!"

_It is a little insane._

It's a lot insane. "As long as he can stop the Risen from piling in we're in good shape; have everyone else stab the ones that make it in." If they take a moronic amount of damage they'll die eventually, if I'm remembering this right. "And switch people once they get tired."

Ok, now I need to go back to the front.

…

Yeah. I have no idea if they're doing well or poorly.

The Risen swarm is shifting though.

…

Close my eyes, and feel…

Yeah, I can…kind of feel that core, the core of a Risen.

…

Unfortunately being able to see the bullseye on a dartboard isn't the same as actually being able to hit it.

Stay focused…the first attack needs to deal as much damage as physically possible, or I'm probably gonna die.

Ok. Doublehanding the sword because I desperately need the bonus to aiming properly. Focus…focus…

Aaand…

Stab!

…Nope, too far right. Wonderful. Pull out, and back off.

I've attracted expected attention. Maybe…half of them?

_You are utterly and totally fucked beyond all reason now._

No shit.

Well, I can see five in front of me…did…did their limbs bend like that before? That looks mildly uncomfortable.

Oh. Its arms can bend in whichever direction it fucking chooses. Uh…

…On the plus side they're only shambling. Hell, that's all they're doing. Behaving very shambling zombie-ish. All groan and moan and no…bone? It almost rhymed.

_So we can back away at a leisurely pace. And fix your sense of danger._

…

You know, Romero zombie movies would be so much less interesting if the main characters saw zombies and just went "oh, that's too bad" and walked away at a leisurely pace. Might be why more recent ones can run and shit.

Well, if these guys are only shambling instead of going balls to the walls on murder then…

Well, one conclusion is that Risen can't naturally exist for very long.

_And if that's the case, then all a village would have to do is lock their gates when Risen are on the loose, assuming they have one. Although that might not be the entire case._

…

Yeah, Assuming if Risen weakens because of the…whatever effect that occurs when they get cried out of the sky, it's entirely possible for subsequent Risen to be resilient or immune to that effect. In which case, fuck all of us.

A different conclusion is that these Risen are weak because they haven't been eating well, which…well, they haven't desecrated any corpses, so that's out.

_You're assuming they eat people._

Well…yes.

_That makes you racist against the Risen, you know that?_

Given they're trying to kill all of us I can live with that.

…

Ok, I can't exactly keep running away, since it solves no problems.

_Sauntering away, you mean._

But even with that weird weakness-detecting thing I can't land a hit.

_You could do it with your bare hand._

And apparently my bare hand can't conduct a sword very well.

…

In any case, let's take a look at the house for a moment.

…

The amount of Risen seemed to have decreased a lot. I think. Might just be a trick of the eyes. Apart from the fact that half of them are trying to kill me instead.

Anyways…

…

Worst part about unenthusiastic and armed vapor zombies is their utter inability to separate from the group. Give me a range advantage goddammit!

…

Che. Having a heavy-ass sword in my hand is actually working against me: I'm too scared to attack since I can't disengage fast enough.

Fuck.

…

**_Darling, Can you hear me?_**

Oh

Oh no

Oh fuck no

**_Lead those things out into the open, will you?_**

_MARIBELLE IS PSYCHIC WE'RE ALL DOOMED AAAAAAH_

There must be a perfectly valid explanation for…uh, for…

Let's…let's just do as she says for now, uh…

The open, the open…

I'm out in the open, now what?

…

Maribelle?

…

I guess it was a one-way communication?

…

_Seems like it._

THANK EVERY GOD EVER.

…

Wings. I hear wings.

Look to the sky.

…

Winged horses.

Pegasus Knights.

Woo!

…

The lead lady, I don't think it's… whatever the royal guard lady's name is. She just drove her Pegasus down onto one of the lead Risen from almost a full vertical drop and trampled the thing outright. She then stabbed one of the other ones with her lance. Long spear, it's not what I traditionally would call a lance…

Too much time in the Total War games methinks.

Her wing..men? winggirls? Winglady? Followed suit and pretty much killed the five Risen really bloody quickly.

And there's the fourth rider, who is also carrying Maribelle, who looks like she ran through a forest and then some. Wow, girl, you look like hell.

"All units attack the monsters! Move!" The lead lady roared and oriented herself toward the house. Her Pe…

JESUS THAT WINGSPAN ON THAT THING IS HUGE

Her Pegasus spreads its wings out flat and runs along the ground like your everyday horse.

Until it got within some pre-determined distance.

It flicked its wings slightly and rose off the ground and dove downwards with the combined mass of both its charge and its (albeit slight) drop.

_Eyes reporting: There may have been a flash of green in front of the Pegasus. The active mind didn't see it though._

The end result of the charge is: Risen splattered against the door and front wall of the house. She hit like three of them in one charge; the rest of the Risen have completely and utterly focused their attention on the newcomer Pegasus Knights.

The games really don't do these guys justice. The pegasi, I mean.

_No comment on the girls?_

Well, they have a fair amount of armor, but most of it seems to be leather or just metallic reinforcements instead of chainmail or something similar. More lightweight, I suppose?

…

While I was off on my tangent the Knights have pulled back while still staying on the ground, to the point where the Risen have been pulled entirely from the door to the house. There's still about a dozen left, though.

The lady flicks her lance and her two wingwomen take off, high enough to be totally out of reach.

_Like about twenty feet off the ground or so._

The Risen follow the two girls that are in the air with their glowy eyes, before settling on the lady that's still on the ground.

Hmm…

"Darling, don't think about jumping in to this fight." I hear Maribelle say. I presume she's talking to me, though her voice lacks the usual…bite.

"Not like I can do much here." I say back, barely turning around to make sure she heard me. And then I head to the house.

…

Stahl, you are a true boss. The man was using a table as a makeshift shield and a basket of swords stored in the armory was next to him. If the shrapnel on the ground is any indication he broke quite a few swords already.

"Whew. You're up! Good afternoon!" Stahl says cheerily. "You must've been very tired to sleep through an attack."

"Yeah, I guess." Mister reliable I am not. "When did they get here?"

Stahl shakes his head. "I heard a noise that must've woke me up, and I saw those things come near the house, so I dove into the house as soon as I could; pity I couldn't have been quicker." Considering there's still seventy percent of the refugees left I can sympathize with him.

"Well, you saved everyone else." I say.

"Speaking of which, is Maribelle outside? We have some wounded I'd like her to look at." Sumia piped up.

_These people were wounded because of YOUR suggestions._

…Yeah. "She is, but she seems a bit out of it." There're also four Pegasus knights outside kicking in heads, if the sounds of the Pegasi neighing is any indication.

"Ok. Can you get…actually, let's get out of here. This place reeks of Risen." Stahl said, getting up and taking off his table shield, setting it near the door. "Alright everyone, we're leaving!"

…

Stepping outside again, and…the Pegasus Knights have killed the Risen, but some of the Pegasi seems to be bleeding quite a bit.

The lead? Lady is talking with Maribelle, and they stop as soon as all us us (Me, Sumia, Stahl, and the refugees) come out of the house.

"I see you're alright at least, Sir Stahl." She says with a contented sigh. "And you too, Sumia."

Sumia…does what I guess is a salute. "Yes ma'am. Although…"

The lady nods. "I understand; you did what you could, no need to be ashamed." Then she looks at me. "And you, sir…are a traveler?"

I nod. "Yeah, though I seem to have picked a horrible time to travel."

She gives an emotionless chuckle. "Indeed...Lady Maribelle," she turns back to Maribelle, who's looking after the wounded refugees with small spurts of magic. "What are your orders next?"

…

What?

"Maribelle has authority?" I mutter to Stahl.

"We're Shepherds. In times of crisis we're all considered officers in the army." He mutters back. Makes sense, seeing as they're the personal unit of the prince.

"Uhm…" Maribelle's distracted with taking care of the wounded and couldn't give an answer.

"Uh." I raise my hand slightly, and the lady looks at me with annoyance in her eyes. "How bad is the R- weird vapor monster outbreak in Ylisse right now?"

"Bad." Is all she says.

"I think…it would be best if we were to quickly report back to the castle; Chrom might get worried about us out here." Stahl says, with zero intention of making it an order.

The Pegasus Knight Lady salutes, with the full intention of having taken Stahl's suggestion as an order. "Yes sir, my squad can take you back to the castle at full speed."

Stahl looked sheepish. "Ah, well…" and then he was dragged off by the Lady.

Maribelle did some last minute heals, stood up, apparently got a little dizzy, and was supported by one of the other girls onto a second Pegasus.

"Sumia, you and…the traveler there" the Pegasus Captain frowns.

"Ash." I helpfully add.

She nods. "Right, you and him stay with the refugees and escort them back to Ylisstol."

"Ash, the carts are prepared properly, have Sumia guide you on what to do." Stahl said, with an apologetic look on his face. I wave nonchalantly to show him that I didn't mind at all.

Sumia nods her affirmative, and the two riders take off. The other two are apparently staying around as actual armed escorts, neat.

…

...

…

From here on out, I'm gonna insist on having a cart every time. So damn good.

Sumia ended up guiding one cart and one cart only since we figured out we could squeeze everyone on to a cart if we let some of the other people (read: kids) ride on the Pegasi instead.

On a similar note, it turns out that there are, in fact, male Pegasus riders, but they're damned rare since most lightweight males in the military tend to go into magic anyways.

_Thinking of being one?_

Eh…I'm pretty sure I'm going to fall off at the first available opportunity, so I'll pass.

Plus…

Pegasus Riders don't seem to be very well armed, so they're effectively flying light cavalry. Which is perfectly fine, nothing wrong with that.

Also I felt vaguely self-conscious being the only guy on the cart.

…

Well, whatever. We're in Ylisstol now.

…

If the walls were any indication this place was sieged pretty hard. Parts of the wall is gouged out in several areas, and some of it looks burned. I know the Risen can use magic, but I don't think…no, a single Risen can't do this kind of damage. A swarm of them, on the other hand…

_Even a swarm of them can't deal this kind of damage to solid stone._

…

If the tone of the local conversation is any indication, the attack must've been pretty bad. Judging by the snippets I caught the Risens came in fairly overwhelming numbers and they had actually moved into the streets of the town before the town guard and castle knights were able to contain the situation.

Ylisstol's defenses are pretty shoddy if that's actually the case then. Hmm...

"So this is Ylisstol…" I hear a girl's voice behind me, and both me and Sumia turn to look.

…

Well, uh…It's not-quite-default girl Robin. Hair color's a little off, though it just might be because of…well, natural lighting; it's a like a dull shade of silver. Body size 1, face type 1, voice...1? Ish?

_How can you tell that it's Robin?_

The tactician's coat.

Which means…yep, that's Chrom, Lissa, and Fredrick the Scowling.

…So I got here a touch earlier than the Prologue, but otherwise the timetables lined up pretty well.

"Chrom!" Sumia says before diving into him. Interestingly enough I don't know if she did it on purpose or was running and fell. Either way Chrom has met Sumia outside the barracks.

"Sumia! When did you get back?" Chrom sounds happily surprised. I guess that means they have like rank C support long before the game even started. Oy.

…aaand now Lissa has jumped in for a group hug.

And now Chrom is on the ground.

And now I should look away before I get a glance up a pair of skirts.

_Aren't you a little late for that?_

_…_

After they had untangled themselves (with the help of Fredrick, who more-or-less pulled Lissa off with one arm), Sumia debriefed Chrom on the situation at hand.

Given how his face progressively dropped during the conversation it's fair to say he's not happy with the news.

"Ah, and who are you?" Lissa said, after apparently finally noticing my existence. Considering that this was after Sumia had introduced me it's fair to say she wasn't listening.

"Ash. Pleased to make your acquaintance, um…" I…guess it would be reasonable to not know who she is? Considering she's constantly under the shadow of Chrom's fame.

"Lissa! Pleased to meet ya!" She says with a bright smile on her face.

God, her good mood is infectious.

"You…don't really know who she is, do you?" Fredrick says, his eyes narrowing.

...

The wording of your question worries me.

But here's to hoping that I roll a twenty on bullshitting. "Well, that's Lord Chrom, the Prince of Ylisse, and you're his devoted bodyguard knight. So that would make Lissa…the Princess?"

"Quite astute of you." Fredrick nods, still looking severe. "What were you doing in Ylisse?"

"Fredrick." Chrom said warningly.

"I wasn't doing anything." I shrug, which is true: prior to suddenly getting pulled into the world I wasn't doing anything. "I was travelling on a boat when I was washed off and found myself on the shoreline; after that, well…" I pointed to the sky with a thumbs-up sign. "I get the feeling I'm probably not going to be travelling anywhere else soon."

_Or a "like" sign._

Chrom nods. "In that case, how about you come work for the Shepherds until this crisis passes?"

"Sir? Are you sure about this?" Fredrick's hand strays to his sword, just a tiny bit.

"From what Sumia has reported he was responsible for saving Stahl, Maribelle, and herself on multiple occasions." Chrom looks directly at Fredrick and frowns a little.

"Though Stahl did most of the heavy lifting." I mutter.

"Thus, I don't believe he's out for my life." Chrom says with a sigh.

Fredrick sighs as well. "Very well, sir, as you wish." His hand is now no longer with grabbing range of his sword.

"Come on. We'll introduce you two to the rest of the Shepherds." Chrom says, leading the way.

…

Now that I've had a chance to actual look at Robin, she seems a bit…I dunno, more reserved than normal? She seems to have a habit of tugging on her sleeves so it covers her hand.

"What's that on your hand?" I ask her. Just in case.

She flinches superbly hard before putting her hand out of sight, and doesn't respond. I don't think this is normal behavior for an amnesiac.

She also feels super shy.

…

Meanwhile, Lissa is being as friendly as friendly can be and stopping to talk to almost everyone on the street.

Given that the response from the peasantry is highly informal I guess she does this on a very daily basis.

And given how Fredrick skipped past the part where he chides her behavior and went straight into the exasperated sigh she definitely does this whenever she can.

…

Chrom.

Chrom?

I don't know how you're not noticing but you're being stalked by like a legion of fangirls.

Like, if you went out looking for a wife you would come home with a hundred. How do you not notice.

How.

…

Once we entered a set of walls, the fangirls had to stop, because they were all normal people and were stopped (albeit gently) by the gate guards. Huh.

…

On the other hand, the fangirl mob is now recreated but only with noble born girls instead.

I don't think the game ever addressed the wall of financial division, especially since the houses on this side are a lot shinier than the ones on the other side.

…

…

"Ash, Robin, could I ask you two to wait out here for a little bit?" Chrom asks.

"Sure." I shrug. Robin nods.

Chrom, Fredrick, Sumia, and Lissa walk into the throne room, with Lissa giving off an excited squeal before the doors closed.

…

Welp, might as well test the waters.

I face Robin after a minute of screwing up my nerves.

"How much do you know?" I ask her.

She looks at me with bewilderment. I'm not sure if it was because I hit a bullseye or it was because I asked a stupid question.

Either way, no response.

…Fine.

"I know what's on your hand, Robin. I'm not an enemy." Take that as you will, girly.

She looks at me again, with her eyes full of fear.

…

And then immediately drops the shy girl façade.

"Damn. Who's side are you on, Naga, or Grimleal?" She asks with a low hiss.

"I'm on Chrom's side." I reply. My daggers are on my waist, I could probably pull them out fast enough if push comes to shove.

She relaxes a little. "Good . Then we're on the same page. What are you?"

Uhm? "I came through an Outrealm gate, if that helps any."

"No, it doesn't. But I get your point. What did you mean by 'how much did I know'?" She asks, her hand on her tome.

…

Shit, talk about a fine balance here.

…

"How much do you know about that symbol, and about those things." I explain.

"I…" She starts before she stops suddenly; the gate was being opened and we were told to go in.

We took about five steps into the room before one of the attending nobles drew a knife and tried to jump Robin.

"Damn you, Grimleal scum! Die!"

Welp.

I stand in front of Robin, because I don't think a fried corpse would make for a good floor decoration.

Overhead swing incoming.

Step in, left upper arm meets his right upper arm, 45 degrees…

Grab his arm with left hand, grab my left arm with my right hand, spin underneath his arm. His arm is now bent awkwardly and his sword is on the ground.

"With all due respect, _sir_," Fredrick says, stopping Chrom from drawing the Falchion. "We do not commit acts of violence based on the difference of religious beliefs. Kindly withdraw from the court."

I let him go, and the man grabs his sword, sheathes it, and leaves without another word.

I turn to look at Robin; she stares at me with annoyance on her face.

"You alright?" I ask.

Something goes off in Robin's head and she nods, looking utterly terrified.

Girl's got insane acting skills.

Emmeryn looks at the door with a frown on her face, before coming forward and bowing to Robin.

"I apologize for his actions; differences in beliefs can lead people to do horrid things. I hope you will forgive him."

Robin nods, and whispers something to Emmeryn, who gets up and smiles.

Chrom then clears this throat. "Ash, Robin, there's a very good reason I asked for you two in here, and, well..."

I shrug. "No harm done."

Chrom sighs. "Well, the reason being that…Fredrick, if you will?"

Fredrick nods and bade the two of us to kneel.

…

Per our achievements (if you can call it that) we were both given ranks of nobility and properly inducted into the Shepherds.

This means, literally, the Shepherds are a nobility only army.

But on the other hand, the definition of nobility is very, very broad.

…

[Later]

…

At dinner, everyone got introduced to everyone else. I got to properly meet everyone except Virion, who was fawning over a Robin doing her best shrinking violet impersonation and being utterly adorable as a result (Lissa wound up next to Robin and hugged the girl at every available opportunity, to Maribelle's immense disapproval) and Vaike, who ate really damned fast then bolted out of the room while yelling about training.

…

[Even Later]

…

I talked Miriel into giving me some basic magic lessons, before Ricken intervened and decided to teach me instead.

Works for me either way.

…

[Night]

…

I got to sleep in a real bed for once!

…

Apparently not for very long, since I'm now waking up to…a weight…on…me?

Silvery grey hair…Robin.

Robin? Why are you straddling me in the middle of the night?

"Robin, what do you want?" I ask sleepily.

"You're a horrid actor, you know that?" She says. "You didn't even flinch when the term Grimleal came up. Why?"

I guess that means everyone else did?

"I don't think I was the only one who didn't flinch." I say, now fully awake. She does me a favor and gets off the bed so I can sit up.

"Well, you, Chrom, and Lissa were the only ones who didn't, and Lissa doesn't count since I don't know if she knew what it meant."

…wow, sorry, Lissa.

"Well, the term is too removed for me to have any attachments to." I say.

She cocks her head. "In other words…"

"I know what it means, but it has no value beyond that."

"I see…" I can almost hear her mind working. "What do you hope to achieve by joining the Shepherds?" She asks next.

...

_Isn't this obvious?_

I grin. "To crush Grima with overwhelming firepower." Not like she can see me in the middle of the night, though.

"What?" She sounds…well, surprised. Not "whoa this guy's amazing" surprised but more "wow this guy's a fucking idiot" surprised.

"You heard me."

"Yeah, I did, I just don't think you've thought it through very well." She says at last.

"It has a physical body, it can take damage, therefore if I carpet bomb the shit out of it, it will die."

_That is the flimsiest logic I've ever came up with._

"And you say this to me, a Grimleal." She says flatly.

"I don't believe you are. Well, not this time." I say.

I hear her take a sharp breath. "So…you do know more than you pretend to." She says after a minute. "Well, fair's fair. I've inherited parts of Grima's memories."

So that means Grima's initial attack on her was partially successful?

"What do you remember?" I need to know how big the discrepancy is.

"Not much." Robin stops her straddle position and sit cross legged on my bed. "Most of my childhood I remember, including the part where I was taken by my mother and we escaped. I also know bits and pieces of what happens in the future, but it's too fragmented for me to properly use. What do you know?"

Hmm... "As of this point? Less and less. A lot of variables are changing on me."

"Wonderful." She sighs, before I hear rustling of clothing. If her shadow is any indication she just extended a hand. "To our combined efforts to kill a god."

I smile, though she can't see it, and take her outstretched hand. "To kill a god."

.

.

.

{ === + === }

Author Notes

A little less focused than normal since...well, this is sort of an in-between thing and I couldn't find a place to transition very well. I don't think I found a place to transition very well still, but eh.


	4. From - Shepherd Barracks

I have to say: minor blessings are upon us for nobody caught her leaving my room in the middle of the night and thought badly of us.

…

…

"Good morning, Ash." I hear…Stahl? While I'm freshening up for the morning, with the first proper wash I've had since…being dropping in the fucking ocean.

"Morning Stahl." I say back, muffled a little by the towel on my face. "How was last night?"

"Eh? Ah." Stahl seemed surprised. _Your phrasing was odd. _"There were some more of those things that popped up last night, but I don't think there was anything serious."

For Ylisstol, maybe.

"Ah, that reminds me." I turn to look at him: Stahl without armor is...very regular. Unkempt brown hair, slight smile, white tunic, grey cloth pants. I can see why he would be the most normal person, despite having balls to the walls defense. "Chrom's called a meeting this morning; we might end up having to leave soon."

"Wonderful." I breathe.

"Not happy about that?"

"I don't have a lot of a combat experience, if you haven't noticed." I say; I'm not even armed right now, not even a knife; Stahl has a knife around his waist. "So if nothing else I'd like to be more prepared. Which reminds me; when can I talk with Miriel?"

"Oh, right, you were planning to learn magic. Uh…She should…oh, Ricken. Good morning, Ricken!" Stahl says as he gets distracted by…

Dear lord Ricken is short without his hat oh my god.

How old was he in the game? Don't remember, but he was a child by modern day standards. He was like the youngest guy before Donnel came along, wasn't he?

"Morning Stahl!" Bundle of energy in the morning, ain't he. "And, uh…"

"Ash."

"Yeah! Hi!" He's like…Lissa in terms of chipper-ness.

"Ricken, do you know when Miriel will be up and ready?" Stahl asks.

"For teaching? Not too sure. If you don't mind, Ash, I could teach you some basics." Ricken says, looking at me.

"That would be awesome." I say with a grin.

…

"So, here, you can see that…" Ricken says as he starts pointing out a magic circle in the fire tome he had in a belt around his waist.

…

Huh.

So quite literally magic is trigonometry based, with a side order of being able to draw perfect circles.

_You're gonna need to work a little on that circle then._

No kidding. Other than that though…being able to place everything where it needs to be within the degree is the most important thing, up to the point where the damage output itself is determined by the triangle angles within the main circle.

…

Ok, wow. This is actually really complicated.

"Ricken, do you have any books on how to construct spells?" I ask him, when he finally has to take a moment to breathe.

"Spell building is really hard." Ricken says, surprised. "Are you sure you want to try that right now?"

"Not really, but it would be nice to have some reference material."

Oh wait, I'm still illiterate.

"Aren't you illiterate?" Stahl asked worriedly.

"Yeah, forgot about that." I sigh.

"I can teach you how to read." Ricken says, without a hint of judgmental-ness in his voice.

Bless your little heart, man.

"Awesome."

…

As it turns out the script used for writing by the locals is…pretty close to English. There are some grammatical differences and some of the letters are different from how they should be, but otherwise it's pretty fast to learn.

_Aren't you glad it isn't like learning Chinese?_

I'm glad it's not rote memorization, yes.

…

"Wow, you're picking this up really fast." Ricken says with a smile.

"It's very similar to the language we use at home." I say, very relieved.

"Oh…so…you're not a traveler then?"

"I am; I just happened to travel through the Outrealm gate first." I say. Need to be a little wearier of covering my bases next time.

"You must be the new student I was supposed to receive." I hear a severe voice behind me. That must be…turn around…ayep. Miriel.

"That would be me. Good morning, Miriel." I wave.

She adjusts her glasses in response. "I see you're making a nominal amount of progress without my assistance."

I look down at the book I'm reading; something fairly popular in Ylisse, covering an event similar to Sacred Stones (Innes – L'Arachel pairing, by the looks of it) "Well, I figured teaching would be easier if I knew how to read first."

In retrospect I never got that the Innes – L'Arachel A support was the two trying to out-tsun each other, but eh.

"I see." She says. "I was here to inform you that we shall not be resting within the sanctuary of the castle for long."

Wonder why.

_Remember what missions two through four were about?_

"How come?" I ask.

"Chrom has decided that we should appeal to Ferox for military assistance." She said. "While he is away the rest of the Shepherds are to assist the local militias in the defense of the villages."

Makes sense. Except we're not really cut out for travelling.

Ricken snapped his fingers. "Oh! I totally forgot. We're supposed to go meet up real soon, too. C'mon, Ash!"

Well, I guess I can read on the way.

Good thing these books aren't obscenely heavy.

…

"Ok, everyone's here." Chrom said after we had walked into the room. I think he just took a repurposed training room since there's training dummies piled haphazardly against the wall and no seats.

"Sorry we're late." Ricken says cheerfully.

"Ok. As you all know Ylisse has been threatened by unknown enemies." Chrom says. "The council has decided to refer to them as 'Risen', and we will refer to them as such as well. Now, Ylisse's villages are in no small amount of danger as a result, and it's our duty as Shepherds to protect our civilians from this threat." He paced around a little. "But a more pressing concern has come up in the meantime."

"What could be worse?" I hear someone mutter. Sounded like Vaike, even though I rarely if ever use him.

"It has come to my attention that Plegia's military is on the move." He says, turning to face us as a murmur runs through the gathering group.

_And apparently you've been misreading Plegia's name all this time, too._

Shame.

"Ah, right." Chrom stopped for a moment when Lissa nudged him or something. "Ash, Robin. Are you two aware of the…well, history between us?"

Robin shakes her head. "No, sir."

I scratch my face. "Only the result."

"Result?" Fredrick says, narrowing his eyes.

"Ylisse and Plegia went to war, massive total war ensues, strained relationship ever since." I say, shrugging. "That sums up what I know."

Chrom nods. "I don't know the exact history either." He admits. "But that's the gist of it. If Plegia is planning to attack then we will not have the manpower to stop them and to keep the Risen from killing our civilians. Thus, I shall be leading an expedition force to Plegia to ask for an alliance. The remainder of the Shepherds shall be tasked to protect Ylisstol as you see fit." So they're not going to leave the confines of the city? Bummer.

"What? What about the people outside the city?" Sully says. It's a girl with red hair, it's probably Sully.

_What wonderful reasoning._

"For the time being they'll have to take care of themselves; Ylisstol's city guard is short on manpower." A person I don't recognize says. I guess that makes him a local noble.

"I don't like it much either, but that's the situation." Chrom says.

Fredrick steps forward. "A minute, if you will. Ash, Robin." We look at him. "I would like both of you to join Chrom's entourage."

"Uh, sure." Robin says, surprised.

I narrow my eyes. "Is this because you don't trust us?"

"Yes, it is." He says without a hint of remorse. Lissa glares at him behind his back.

I shrug. "Just checking."

Robin raised her hand. "I'm not sure why having the untrustworthy people accompany the prince is a good idea."

Fredrick smiles. Man that is creepy. "Oh, it's not that you're accompanying him, it's so that I can keep an eye on the two of you."

"So who else is going?" I ask.

"Besides us four, Vaike, Miriel, Lissa, and Sumia, as well as some Pegasus knights from the royal guard."

I'm not sure how taking out units from the garrison and putting others in constitutes good strategy, but ok.

…

…

I can see why Chrom can re-class into a cavalier. He's pretty majestic while on horseback.

_Majestic._

We're on the road while on horses. What else is there to say?

_How 'bout why nobody who knows how to ride a horse is with us?_

Sully and Stahl are rapid response units, Virion can shoot from a distance. What more reason do you need to keep them around the castle?

Chrom is riding alone because he's fucking badass and has a super powered sword.

Robin's riding with Fredrick and looking like she desperately needs to stab someone, while Fredrick is being quite upbeat and jovial.

Vaike's riding with Miriel. Well, more like "Vaike is driving for Miriel" since she's nose-deep into whatever book is in her hands while Vaike tries and fails to make small-talk.

_Something the active brain isn't telling us is that the people (Chrom being the exception) who are ground pounder units in the game are all riding with someone else, since if there's a conflict they would have to get off and fight._

Right, what the little voice said.

_So who are you riding with?_

Lissa.

Who is bouncing in her…seat? Saddle? And making me feel like I need to be arrested.

Given how happy she is I'm a little worried that she doesn't get out much.

"You're quite happy about all of this." I say after a few minutes of listening to her hum.

"I get to go somewhere without having to walk all the time. Of course I'm happy!" She says, leaning back into me.

The fact that she has zero concept of personal space is utterly terrifying. And the fact that I'm about as old as her sister makes me feel…uh.

_Should I call Chris Hansen?_

If you can pay for the phone bill.

…

On the other hand.

"Do the Shepherds do a lot of patrolling on foot?" I ask.

"I do a lot of patrolling on foot." She says. "I can't keep my balance and heal if I'm on a horse."

…

That…that's actually a pretty reasonable explanation for why she's using me as a wall right now.

"For someone who's never ridden a horse before you've picked it up really fast." She says after a couple of minutes.

_Good point; it's not like your sense of balance is any better._

Huh.

I ride a little closer to Fredrick and Robin.

"Sir Ash, should you attempt something untoward to the princess," Fredrick says with a raised eyebrow after seeing Lissa's position relative to me.

"I know; Robin." I get her attention; like Miriel she was reading, but judging by how dazed Robin looked she wasn't as used to reading while on the move as Miriel was.

"Yes?"

"You can 'see' things, right?" I ask her. Here's to hoping that gameplay and story are not segregated.

"Uh…yeah."

"Can you see what Chrom's special abilities are?"

"Special…?" She mutters, and peers at Chrom's direction. "He has something called Dual Strike Plus."

Which is…innate Lord skill, if I remember right.

"What does it mean?" She asks me.

"I have no idea; what do I have?" I ask her. She looks at me.

"Uh…" She squints. "I can't read the names, but it's…the picture of a sword and a picture of an arch."

Picture of a sword…so that would be Discipline? And the Arch is indoor fighter, I guess.

Huh. So discipline is the reason why I can suddenly ride a horse?

_I think staying on a horse and actually riding on one are two different things._

Eh. I can't fight on foot or on horseback, so it's all good.

_How optimistic of you._

"Why'd you ask?" She says.

"Just curious." I shrug.

I hear a woosh over my head and look up; Four Pegasus Knights (plus Sumia) swoop over our head; the lead one, a lady I don't recognize, land near Chrom and rides up next to him once her bird-horse folds its wings. They talk for a while, and then Chrom raises an arm to get us to halt.

Chrom then gets Fredrick and Lissa's attention.

Why Lissa? She nudges me and points to Chrom.

"There is a group of Risen in front of us." He says after we've gotten close enough to hear him. "Should we avoid them?"

"I think we should; fighting them would delay our plans." Fredrick says, scowling. "However, leaving them alone could very well endanger any other travelers that take this road."

Which, given what we've seen on our ride so far, is a grand total of zero. I guess the fear of the Risen is choking travel.

"I'm with Fredrick here." I helpfully chip in. "Besides, I don't think I can stay on the horse if we take a path that isn't flat."

Chrom chuckles and nods.

"Shepherds! We ride into battle!" He yells, and goes ahead at a speed faster than a trot.

…

Wait, I'm supposed to keep up? Oh hell.

…

…

"I take back what I said earlier." Lissa says shakily as she hops off the horse.

Given that she was trying to break my arms while I tried to keep up with Chrom I can't exactly blame her.

"I'm never riding a horse again." She says while getting her staff out.

We're far enough to see the Risen, and they're just milling around aimlessly around the bridge, which means we're at the map area of mission one.

"Alright. Robin, your orders?" Chrom says, dismounting and pulling the Falchion from its sheath.

He had a sheath for the Falchion? Never knew that.

"Uhm…" Robin stares at the Risen. "I'm not quite sure if they noticed us yet; Fredrick, Ash, ride forward and attack."

…Wait what

"You know I'm not a rider type, right?" I ask her hesitantly.

She shrugs in response. "You're not an anything type. Hurry up, the Risen aren't gonna kill themselves."

…To be fair she's exactly right. Hell, at this point I'm less useful than Donny, and he at least has uber growths.

Ok.

Fredrick and his armored horse rides up near me. Fredrick has a lance in his hand.

"The orders from the tactician are final. Stay near me, and you'll be safe."

Deep breath, and hope that this is in fact Fire Emblem, and in Fire Emblem the tactician is OCD about people not dying.

_And you've never had to reset when someone died ever._

…

Well, shit.

No point worrying about that now I suppose.

Bringing out the lance. Wish I had an actual lance instead of this spear thing, but ok.

Alright.

…

Ok.

_Psyching yourself up there?_

"Ok…go!" I hear Robin command. Was she giving out orders the whole time?

_Focus!_

CHAAAAARGE!

I WISH I HAD MORE TIME TO RETHINK MY LIFE CHOICES!

_Wow horses galloping are fast. You holding those reins there? Yes, yes you are, and with enough dedication to turn your hand white, too, impressive._

_We're coming up near the Risen now, you ready?_

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

_I take that as a yes. Don't ride directly into the Risen now._

PULL BACK ARM. _Risen's right there._

PUSH ARM FORWARD.

Risen impaled in spear.

Actually, spear has been forgotten inside Risen.

Risen also seems to be relatively disdainful of gravity.

Gravity's reputation as a harsh mistress is well deserved.

_What the active mind isn't saying is that he charged into the Risen with the spear and lost his grip during the charge impact. The resulting momentum sent the Risen into the air (not very high but very far, mind you) and it came crashing down with a mighty roll into a nearby tree._

And the spear broke into little pieces inside it. I don't think I'm getting it back.

_Oh, you're back._

Freak out has finished since I'm not charging anymore. I'm also short a spear and there are way more Risen here than I gave credit for. And they're all pissed, wonderful.

Fredrick swings his spear in a decidedly not-stabby way and blows a few Risen away; judging by the fact that they're getting back up it wasn't fatal.

"Ash, we're done, back." He commands. I nod and turn the horse around, and we leave in a hurry.

Because the angry vapor zombies are trying to kill all of us, c'mon horse. Run like you mean it.

…

"Wow, that was nice." Robin said, complete with wide-eyed surprise. "Do you have another weapon, Ash?"

I pull out a sword. "Yeah, I'm good."

She nods, at looks at the Risen running at full speed toward us. "Circle around the outside of the Risen and pick off any of straggler ones." She then takes a deep breath. "Attack!"

Miriel pulls out a wind tome and blasts the first line of Risen, immediately blunting whatever charging power they had.

The Pegasus knights (minus Sumia who is now on the ground) then dive into the Risen from their position in the sky.

That is like the most effective counter charge: Pegasi have more momentum than horses (since they can dive thanks to gravity) and now the Risen are either blown clean away into each other or knocked down due to the force of the wind the Pegasus wings gave once they took off again.

And thus we're capitalizing.

Fredrick's riding among the Risen and stabbing anything that's moving, Vaike is…Vaike is twirling around with his axe outstretched being the most hazardous unit ever but he's also mowing down everything.

Miriel and Robin are burning things alive (fire, electricity, same outcome)

_So they're making undead redead?_

And Chrom is…dismounting with his Falchion, kicking ass and taking names. Also his jumping power is a little absurd. It's not the game's insane…super jump, but it's pretty damn close. He's jumping high enough to go straight over Risen.

Sumia's doubling as land infantry and stabbing anything that's about to get up. She's fast and stabby, but a little lead-footed.

And Lissa has her heal staff, staring intently at the crowd. Every so often she would move closer to a person and pump a heal into their back, before withdrawing again to a safer distance.

_So what are you doing?_

Commentating while trying to get my horse to dive into the fray, which he, like any sane animal, refuses to do.

Fine then. Be that way. Dismount and mop up on foot.

…

Risen Soldier. Hello. Nice to see you on the ground.

Say that's a nice unprotected throat you got there it would be a shame if I were to STAB it.

…

Wait.

It's working?

_You didn't think it would?_

I was too caught up in adrenaline. The Risen we fought before took ludicrous amounts of damage before they died. What makes these guys different?

Hmm…

Well, ponder later, mop up now.

Every now and then some Risen would get up and try to charge at the nearest target, except Miriel is on the job and just shuts down any charge that happens with her wind tome.

Or she just cuts to the chase and blows the poor, poor zombie's head off with a blast of fire.

Outside of the game-imposed restriction of her being level one on join, she's quite literally the most skilled mage here. Robin usually needs two or three shots to take down a target, while Miriel can usually make do with one shot, occasionally one shot for two kills.

In terms of their targeting prowess Robin chars the shit out of everything she hits and Miriel only incinerates very select body parts.

I'm not sure if that was supposed to be reassuring.

…

How many Risen are left…

One…two…five.

And they're running.

_You win._

Do we?

Robin seems to share my thoughts, judging by her scowl. "I've never seen them retreat before." She mutters.

I don't think we have enough data points to make that assumption.

"Ash. Did you ever see them do that?" She asks me.

"The few times we went up against Risen the attacks only stopped when they all died." I said, finding the horse I abandoned and leading it back to the…group of people. We're not exactly a camp here.

She taps her chin. "Interesting. These Risen also seemed more fragile than the ones I met back then." Back then…chapter…two?

That would make this place chapter three then.

_Really?_

Prologue is kill Chrom, One is Robin, Two is Everyone, three is this road. Yeah, three.

Did I mess it up before? I could've sworn I did…

_Or maybe you messed it up now._

"You ok over there?" Lissa asks, waving a hand in front of my eyes.

"Yeah, just a little…" I trail off, since I'm not sure what "I'm just a little" about.

"Maybe these guys came from a different source?" I hear Fredrick say as Robin brings up this issue with him and Chrom.

Different source…

…

Oh.

The…fanservice dark flier lady. What's-her-face. Could summon Risen.

So…These Risen could've been summoned by her?

_Maybe not her specifically, but from the Grimleal? Remember that in chapter 4 Ferox's guards said they were getting raided by Plegian soldiers._

In that case it would be…really bad. If the Plegians could summon Risen, even weak ones, it means they have…well, way more power than I hav—

"HEY!" Lissa. Hi Lissa. Why are you scowling at me.

"Um?"

"Don't ignore me!" She pouts.

"Sorry."

"Like I was saying; where did you learn to ride like that?" She asks.

Ride like what?

"Ride like…" I fish for some clues.

"Y'know." She makes some weird gesture with her hand. "Sending them flying like that."

…

"I'm pretty sure the Pegasus knights did a better charge than I did." I said, tilting my head towards the girls in question.

"I'm also interested, Ash." Fredrick says, coming up to me; whatever discussion the leadership group had had apparently finished. "For a man of your size to send Risen flying, I am truly impressed."

...

_Would…would that be considered "damned by faint praise?"_

I guess?

"I'm not sure what the…praise-worthy action was." I say after a few seconds.

…

…

"You just looked so majestic charging like that!" Lissa gushes.

It's been five minutes and SHE HASN'T DROPPED THE ISSUE

_Aren't you glad someone admires you?_

…

…

…

Camp time.

The girls occupy four tents (two for the Shepherd girls, two for the NPCs)

The men occupy two tents (one for Chrom, one for the rest of us)

…

I opt to sleep outside because holy shit Vaike is a loud snorer.

…

"Hey." I hear someone sit next to me. Turn and look…hi Robin.

"Shouldn't you be asleep?" I ask her, from my comfy spot on the grass.

_You're also lying down._

Yeah I think that's kind of a given, considering its sleepy time.

She sighs. "Too excited to." She didn't spend as much energy as the rest of them during the fight, I suppose.

_You're in the same boat._

"Why are you out here?" She asks.

"Vaike."

We both turn to look to the tent, and she sighs again.

"I wanted to talk to you, but there wasn't time today." She says; we were riding fairly hard after the fight to make up for the lost time during the battle. "Well, I'm here now."

I chuckle. "Yeah; so what do you want to talk about?"

"What did you think about today's Risen? As an Outrealmer, I mean." As opposed to…hell the fact that I'm from the Outrealm Gate isn't exactly privy knowledge.

"Comparatively weaker than I expected; did you see anything unusual with them?" I reply.

"Um…" She squeezes her eyes shut and tries to remember. "A five?" A fiv

"A five."

"I was a little busy to watch for their oddities, ok?" She sulks. "Do you have any leads though?"

I don't think she was reading a stat, so I have no idea. There's no skill in the game represented by a five.

"No clue." I shrug.

"Really?"

"Really."

"Shame." She sighs again, and then lies down.

…uhm?

"Shouldn't you be going back to your tent?"

"Why? It's not like you're going to do anything."

_Wow._

She...I guess she's looking at the sky. "Just between us: I find them a little uncomfortable to be around."

Huh. "How come?"

"I don't know. It's…a weird feeling I get."

…

Ding. "Is it strongest around Chrom?"

Judging by the suddenly rustling I was on the mark. "Yes." She says after a few moments.

_Well it's obvious, she's head over_

No.

_Oh fine._

It could be a Grima vs Naga thing; Robin's supposed to be the ultimate vessel for Grima, and Chrom's the ultimate vessel for Naga. It's not a problem in the game though…

"Maybe it's love."

_Oh fuck you, stealing my idea._

Hehehe. It's the idea from the same person.

"Ha. Ha." She says with a vocally expressed emotional value of zero. "It would be better if it was love." She adds after a moment. "I just don't understand it, and it scares me."

…

Lady, you don't have total amnesia, shouldn't you at least be aware of why you're getting that feeling?

_Obviously if she knew she wouldn't be confused by it._

"So I'm sleeping out here for the night too."

_LAWL_

That is not a word, inner self.

_There's no word that can express the absurdity of the situation._

"Well, suit yourself." I say, and close my eyes.

…

…

…

Someone's giggling above my head. It's probably Lissa.

_Here's a mental image of Miriel being a giggly type girl._

Great, thanks.

Open the eyes…Yellow hair, weird hair decorations, yep. Lissa.

It's...ok, not that bright. So she's just an early riser.

"Ooh, how bold." The grin on her face just radiates mischievous glee.

On another note, I feel a bit heavier than I did the night before, and I don't think it's just the pre-awake grogginess.

…Yep. yep.

"It gets pretty cold up in Ferox doesn't it?" I ask her, trying to sound casual.

She giggles. "Oh, very."

Robin had snuggled up to me during the night.

I didn't think we were that close already…then again being cold is different from outright snowing.

I'm going to catch so much flak for this. But first, I need to get up.

…

Lissa, I would like it if you stopped giggling like a maniac now.

…

Also I really should've just brought out my sleeping stuff instead of trying to man mode it through the night. My head feels like it's been attached incorrectly. Ugh.

…

And now Lissa's off to bother Robin. Great.

"Hey, hey." I hear her say, while gentling pushing Robin.

Robin mumbled something and Lissa giggles harder.

I hear a rustling behind me, and a head of silvery pink (pink? It looks pink) hair comes out.

"Good morning, Ash." Sumia says, with a slight bow despite her grogginess. "And Lissa. What…"

"Good morning, Sumia. Lissa is having fun." I say lightly, my brain finally kicking in.

"The two of them were sleeping out here in the morning and cuddling!" Lissa says. At this point her giggle is almost omnipresent.

"Oh." Sumia looks at Robin, and then looks at me. "That's nice." She then says in a disinterested voice.

"Oh come on, Sumia! Don't you think that they…" Lissa then flushes because she's reaching into adult territory.

Sumia then stares at me for a moment. "No, I don't think he could."

…

_Man, you are just getting no breaks._

…

Soon enough Robin woke up, and her response was a calm and cold "I don't remember anything." Which took the sails out of Lissa's ship and she sulked for the rest of the morning, up to and including when we set out again.

She stopped sulking once the weather got a lot colder all of a sudden, favoring instead to snuggle against some blankets we brought out. Everything she says has, almost as if by magic, transformed from teasing to complaints against the cold.

…

…

Well, ok, it's not really magic since the past few days have been mind-numbingly dull travel. I mean, the lack of vapor zombies trying to kill us is nice, but having some kind of interaction on the road would be good too.

_Lissa?_

She is…uh.

_You've tuned her out for the past few days haven't you._

A little, yeah.

…

In my defense she spent the first day trying to get a reaction out of Robin and me, and when we didn't comply she sulked the rest of the second day. And I was preoccupied with getting Miriel to teach me as much as possible while on the move.

_How'd that work out?_

Not well at all. I was shunned just like Vaike.

…

On day…what is it, five? Fredrick came to check up on me after I had ridden ahead and stop the instant I cleared this hill on the road.

"Ash, is everything alright?"

Well, if you discount the sudden flurry we find ourselves in. "Yeah, I'm fine, just a little blinded."

He chuckles. "Feroxi weather can sneak up on the best of us; did you see how far our destination was?"

Eeh… "Can't be too far ahead." Judging by the increased amount of rubble around us.

Also, the Feroxi guardsmen should clean up after themselves more; the gate is like littered with abandoned clothing, shields, scraps of armor…

Corpses…

Corpses this far out from the gate?

"Fredrick, what do you think about that?" I point to the corpses lying on the side of the road.

He dismounts and checks them closely. "Looks like Ferox has been getting some unwanted visitors; these men are dressed like Ylissean militia."

Come to think of it I don't think I've ever seen anything akin to an Ylissean regular yet. It's always either the local town guard or the (I assume) aristocratic knights.

"Would Ylisse send any soldiers this way?" I ask him, a little unnecessarily.

"Considering that the two countries have fair relations, no. Even if the relations were worse, we wouldn't be sending militia. Come, we should report this to Chrom." He says, re-mounting and going back down at a trot.

…

"So…this means someone has been posing as Ylissean soldiers and harassing Ferox?" Robin says, the quickest to catch up in the makeshift tent.

"I fear so, milady." Fredrick says. Robin scratches her head.

"Great. So what do we do now, Chrom? If we reach the gate we're sure to be attacked." She says.

"I wouldn't worry about that." Fredrick says with a smile. "Feroxi soldiers value valor above all else; if we can prove that we are honorable in battle then we should get our entrance."

At the cost of several good Feroxi men, unfortunately.

Robin sighs. "Just great. Ash, what do you think?"

That single question perks Lissa up to no end. The girl up to this point has been huddled next to Chrom trying to sap his body heat. She's now looking at me with the biggest victory grin on her face.

I sigh as well. "Fredrick, how much less do they value an alpha strike?" Damn. Used slang.

Fredrick looks at me blankly. "I beg your pardon?"

"Sorry. Local term; if we were to hit them with everything we've got on one go, would that pass as Feroxi Valor?"

Fredrick mulls it over for a moment. "I'm not quite sure what you mean still, however, as long as we fight them head on it should prove to be sufficient."

Hmm…head on. That's a pretty broad requirement.

_It also should be applied directly to the forehead._

Robin also mulls it over, her epic strategy brain going into overdrive. It takes her about a minute before she snaps her fingers and then looks at me again. Lissa lost interest since we're being professional about everything.

_Thank god._

"I have a plan in mind; Ash, do you know what we're going to be up against?"

"He's psychic?" Chrom said, surprised.

"I'm originally from the Outrealm gate." I say. "I thought I mentioned that."

"To Ricken." Miriel says absentmindedly.

Chrom shrugs. "It's no big deal. So?"

My turn to scratch my head. "We're probably going to be up against a checkpoint. High wall, immovable gate, side entrances. Plan A would be to assault the side gates as quickly as possible…"

"But that would expose us to fire from the enemy garrison." Robin finished.

I nod. "Right. Plan B is to have our heaviest hitters get an airlift over the wall while our mages lay down covering fire on the enemy ranged units."

Silence.

"I assume covering fire means we-" Robin indicates herself and Miriel. "fire at the enemy archers, from the bottom the wall, and not knowing where they are."

"Well, kind of." I say as Robin rolls her eyes. "As long as you stop the enemy ranged units from hitting our fliers then the concept of covering fire would work just fine."

"What's your goal for this fight?" Robin asks, her eyes narrowing with what I believe is suspicion.

"To get the Feroxi soldiers to stop without killing a single one of them." I say.

Silence.

"Seriously?" Lissa sounds…doubtful, to put it politely.

"Yeah; all things considered killing a Feroxi garrison isn't good for anyone."

Robin nods. "I see. Then I assume you would agree to diplomacy first?"

I shrug. "As long as it works." I look at Chrom. "Your highness."

"Chrom is fine, Ash." Chrom says almost automatically.

"If we were to go with Plan B it would almost depend on your ability to subdue the enemy captain as fast as possible, which means you're going to be in the center of the battle." I say.

He nods. "You're trying to end the battle without killing anyone; for that, I'm willing to lead the charge."

Robin also nods. "I assume you would need me as a front line attacker if things go poorly?"

…

Right, I can't actually fight.

I know Robin's kickass but my inner unreasonable chivalry is acting up.

"Yeah; if we're going with Plan B I would need you to keep the enemy off of Chrom while he beats the captain down."

"Shouldn't be too hard." Robin says. "I'll work out the small details; let's hope we won't need this."

"I'm FREEZING!" Lissa finally says, having taken enough of the talk.

Miriel, who was warming herself out of Lissa's line of sight with a small fire, smirked.

…

…

"Halt! State your business!" A woman shouts. Probably the stage boss.

_Welcome to chapter four!_

Uuuuugh why did we do this nearly at night. It's nice that we don't have to spend night five outside, but come the fuck on.

It's nearly dark and it's snowing. This sucks.

"Chrom, the Prince of Ylisse, would like an audience with the Feroxi Khan!" Fredrick shouts.

"Ha! We're not falling for that ruse again!" A different voice, gruff and…well, not-woman, shouts.

Again, huh. "I guess you're not the first Chrom to pass through here." I wish I remembered what the boss name was. Would make things a lot more interesting. I then pick up my voice to shout. "Would you look over the wall and tell me if bandits would bring a little girl with them to battle?"

"I'm not a little girl." Lissa grumbles, as Robin makes a very-quickly-stifled laugh.

You're the littlest girl here, Lissa.

_I noticed you weren't about to say that out loud._

Because I don't have a death wish; I also see someone poke their head over the wall for a moment the duck back down.

"Say what you will; if you desire to meet with the Khan then prove it on the battlefield!"

Shit.

"Chrom, back up." I say.

He does fast enough to move quite a few steps, and the javelins the wall defenders threw land harmlessly where he would have been.

Sumia isn't here still. I kind of need her to be here. Damn.

Fine, Plan B and a half.

"Miriel, ready flares, Robin, do your thing." Miriel brings out a fire tome and chants something under her breath.

"Chrom, Vaike, Fredrick, you guys ready?" Robin asks, getting three nods in reply. She then looks at me.

Deep breath. "Fire!"

Miriel launches a spate of fire…spell balls into the air and they explode after they've cleared the gate, with way more brightness than they usually do. I hear the lady trying to rally her men after they undoubtedly stared at the makeshift flash bangs.

The four Pegasus knights we had swoop down, land, and immediately take off again as the four attackers mount up.

Miriel then takes out her wind tome and fires a large blanket of wind in the rider's general direction.

I don't think there were any archers inside the garrison in the game. Not the same as reality though.

Speaking of reality, the not attacking people are in danger of being mobbed by a small group that had sallied from a side gate.

"Ash." Miriel says as a warning.

"I know; keep the fliers covered." I flex my fingers. "Here goes nothing." And here's to hoping the few training sessions with Fredrick the past five days have paid off.

_I'm amazed you talked him out of fanatical fitness hour._

I don't think he remembered. Not about to remind him though.

Am I…not exactly upwind; but the snow isn't getting into my face. Ok. Stay focused.

First guy, sword user. Overhead swing.

Shoulder charge him. Hit. Ow. Armor does indeed hurt in full physical contact.

Grab his arm, twist. Spin counterclockwise, maintain grip on wrist. Twist a little more.

Disarmed. Roundhouse kick to his shins, lay him down. FUCK armor hurts. Ow.

Back up, back up. Second guy, third guy…axe, spear user. Axe guy's coming in with a side sweep. Back off, back off…

Forunately they're not targeting Lissa or Miriel at all. Good thing these guys are proud warrior types.

Axe guy coming again. Overhead swing. Duck to the side, punch punch punch to the face. He's dazed. Full body tackle to his chest!

Target down, and I think I need a massage after this. Ow.

Third threat, spear, stabby mc face stabber. Isn't letting me get anywhere near him. Smart man.

But then I don't need to defeat you at all. I just need to buy time.

"Lost your nerve, little man?" He snarls. I just stare at him.

"My job is to protect the girls; if you're not going to do anything I'm not going to do anything."

He isn't about to stab a defenseless little girl, or a Miriel doing god knows what.

_Lissa isn't really defenseless though._

In a war she would be a valuable asset as a healer. With her heal stick hidden she's a pretty pretty scared little princess.

_Pretty sure this doesn't count as valor._

The end justifies the means in this case.

…

After a few minutes of us staring each other down, I hear a roar from inside the garrison, followed by a shouted command from the captain of the garrison, telling her soldiers to stand down.

The man instantly brings his spear point away from me. They're well trained.

"Lissa." I look at her. She looks at me, then her brain clicks and she brings out her staff to look at the two guys on the ground.

"Pretty light injuries, they'll be fine." She says after she patches them up.

"So she was a healer. No wonder you wanted her protected." The man said.

"Yeah, well. With everything that's happening right now it would be wrong for Ferox to lose soldiers to a misunderstanding."

"For us to lose men, eh? You cheeky little bastard." He shakes his head.

…

…

"How did it go?" I ask Chrom after everyone is indoors.

"As well as it could be expected." Robin said while Lissa patches her up. "Fighting without killing anyone is unusually difficult."

"Once we had reached lady Raimi" so that's her name "the rest of the soldiers were all too happy to stand around and watch, especially since none of us were keen on continuing the attack."

_And?_

And?

_AND?!_

OH! Right. I'm a fucking heartless bastard. "What about the Pegasus Knights?"

The four ladies…wow, they've, like, been ignored all this time. I feel like a horrible person now.

_You still don't know their names._

Par for the course.

"They dismounted and assisted the ground assault while their Pegasus flew to a safe distance." Fredrick replied.

"You girls didn't have to do that." I say, with a slight bow. "But thanks all the same; is anyone hurt then?"

"We have Vulneraries, sir, we'll be fine." The leader said. Sir?

Lissa probably saw the confused look on my face. "You're a Shepherd, remember?"

Well, yeah. Not like I feel good about it, but eh. Whatever.

"Either way; Lissa, if you could…"

"Way ahead of you." She says happily, bouncing over to the four knights.

…

After about an hour or so (along with Lissa almost getting one girl to strip so she can attend to said girl's injuries. Keyword being almost) Chrom was finally given audience with…

Who? Flavia. Basilio was in Lucina's corner.

Chrom was finally given audience with Flavia, and…he's only allowed two other members of his entourage.

"Take Fredrick and Robin." I say, after he looked at me almost expectantly.

"Are you sure?" Robin asked.

"I have awesome outrealm psychic powers. I'm sure." I say with a grin.

_A goofy grin._

My grins are always goofy.

Chrom shakes his head. "I'll take your word for it, then; stay out of trouble." He says as he sees Vaike napping confortably on a long bench or something in…here.

A very sparsely furnished hallway with chairs thrown in.

"You're really confident all of a sudden." Lissa said, sitting down next to me and taking a deep breath. Healing takes a lot out of you, I see.

"Just about what they're going to talk about."

"What are they going to talk about?" Lissa asked, getting…

Uncomfortably cozy around me. I hope it's because I look meek and for no other reason.

"Chrom's going to participate in an arena match and we're going to the reinforcements we want if we win." I say.

…

Yeah, wow. I think Lissa's just tired; she looks really damned pale.

"Are you ok?" I ask her.

"Yeah, just…fine." She trails off as she…yeah she's like dead tired. I motion for the attention of the Pegasus knights; their leader comes over, and I interrupt her mid-curtsy.

Really, don't do that. "Can you get her something warm?" I ask quietly. The knight looks at Lissa and nods; they brought some of their equipment, including the extra blankets.

So now Lissa is using me as a pillow and looking about comfortable as she could possibly be under the circumstances.

She's adorable.

...

Also I can't move my legs, which is bothering me.

_Quick! Think of a distraction!_

Where's Sumia? She…

She was supposed to get her Pegasus between the battle on the road and now, and she's…well, if she doesn't get a big damn heroes moment she should at least be here by now.

"Do you happen to know where Sumia went?" I ask the leader Pegasus knight.

She shakes her head. "No, sir; last I saw of her she was with the prince."

Hrm. Hopefully she's not dead or captured somewhere.

_Best guess._

She's a rescue target instead of Mirabelle or something.

…

…

"We're back and what are you doing?" I hear a voice say.

_You fell asleep and could've been dreaming._

It's late, and I've had horrible rest on the road. It's to be expected.

At least the voice had the decency to keep himself quiet.

"Being really tired." I mumble.

"I can see that. I what I want to know is why is my sister on your lap." So that's Chrom. Also unintentional innuendo.

"Because she's out like a light and I can't feel my legs. Help." I don't even bother opening my eyes; this spot on the pillar is just too comfortable.

"Well, you'll get a real bed in a few minutes; same for you, Lisse. You'll catch a cold sleeping here."

Lissa mumbles something unintelligible and rolls onto the ground with an "ouch."

"So what's the news?" I stretch.

"We're going to help Khan Flavia get her status as the ruling Khan in two days' time in the arena." Fredrick says, helping Lissa up.

"Ohey, it's exactly like you said." Lissa mumbles, as Fredrick leads her to her prepared room.

"Yeah, yeah. Where am I sleeping?"

…

…

And so now that I'm actually in a bed…

I'm WIDE AWAKE.

WHY


	5. From - The Longfort

"Good morning!"

So apparently I passed out cold in the middle of raging about insomnia.

"Hello~ anybody there?"

On one hand I want to be entirely justified to rage but on the other hand I'm really, really happy about a good night's sleep for once.

_No one bothering you, no Risen in the middle of the night._

No Risen? I guess I was just too out of it to care, huh…

"Hey! I said, good morning!"

_So who's that raging at you?_

No idea. I don't want to open my eyes to check.

Ow.

_That was most definitely a pillow._

It hurt in a painless kind of way.

"Good morning to you too, Lissa." I say, sitting up.

"About time." She pouts. "Wow, you actually slept in your armor?"

Look down.

Yep, I did.

"Looks like it." I stretch. At least I had the decency to unarm first.

_You didn't; your weapons were confiscated at the entrance to the bedding quarters._

Same difference.

"You ok over there?" She says, waving a hand over my face.

"I'm a slow starter. What time is it?"

"Breakfast. Chrom wanted you for something too, by the way."

Yay, breakfast.

…

And discussions about the world, I guess.

But mainly breakfast.

…

…

After breakfast, Chrom and Fredrick (and Robin and Lissa) came to meet me at my table.

Nope, not conspicuous at all.

"Ash, I'm interested about what Lissa said before we rested for the night." Fredrick started.

"Huh? What did I say?" Lissa said with a small gasp.

"Something about it being 'exactly as you said', Ash." Chrom said. "Don't misunderstand, I trust you completely…"

"But…?" I ask.

"But I have suspicions about how much you know, Ash." Fredrick says with a terrifying smile.

I sigh. "For the record, the more I talk, the less useful the information will be."

"So you know a lot about us?" Lissa said, sounding a little offended.

Well now I feel like a prick.

So how do I phrase this…?

"It's not like that; it just seemed odd to me that a warrior nation like Ferox will do something normal like…elections, for example." I stop for a second. "Amendment: a reasonable warrior nation like Ferox."

"Elections?" Lissa repeats, with a mild tone of confusion. I don't think representative democracies are a thing yet.

"And so you predicted that Chrom would be participating in the Arena match tomorrow simply based on that?" Fredrick said, his hand resting on his sword.

"In my defense I had no intention of being right; I didn't think Ferox would do something like a fight to the death, so an Arena match would be the next thing." I say.

Lissa giggled. "You're too serious, Fredrick."

Fredrick scowls. "It's my duty to protect my charges, however difficult that may be." He then turns to me. "So how much do you know about the opponents we will face in the arena?"

…

Huh.

"Nothing at all." I shrug.

No point letting that cat out of the bag, now is there?

Fredrick scowls deeper, but sighs and takes his hand off his sword hilt.

Chrom then turns because Vaike had tapped him on the shoulder and was now demanding for a spar.

Well then, *I* need to learn.

…

And Miriel is nowhere to be seen. Wonderful.

_Bite the bullet._

"Lissa." I say. Fredrick's narrows his eyes, but Chrom isn't there because Vaike had dragged him off.

I'm not gonna make a move on the underaged princess. Chill.

"Yep?" She turns and looks at me and beams.

"Uh…I'm still trying to learn magic. Teach me?"

"You know I heal, right?" She says, with a small "are you kidding?" type smile on her face.

"Yeah. I figured magic would have some pretty similar basics; if they don't that's fine, I just need to get a lot more useful faster."

"If I may." Fredrick interjects. "I, as a Steward, know a few things about basic usage of magic. I could teach you instead of the princess, so long as actual casting is not required."

Sounds good to me. "That will be very greatly appreciated, Fredrick."

"Uh." Lissa looks at me. "Why did you ask me, out of curiosity?"

…

_Minefield detected._

…

"Because Miriel isn't here yet." I feel like I'm defying some kind of expectation here but priorities must be made.

She nods and walks away without another word.

"Perhaps you could also do with a lesson in the proper treatment of a lady." Fredrick idly says while flipping through his…where was he keeping that? notebook.

…

…

Turns out Fredrick is an insanely good teacher, as far as basic theory is concerned.

But I have to admit that his description of magic isn't exactly what I expected.

Magic is…less like air that you breathe in and make use of, but more like…chlorinated pool water? You swim in it and you (by and large) use it but you don't want to drink it.

Well, any more than accidentally, anyways.

The lack of a scientific method in the world of Fire Emblem means the definition's really fucking vague. And, as Fredrick implied, every mage has their own method of accessing magic.

Point being, use magic through the casting circles; while everyone can cast magic, not every has the ability (also vaguely defined) to make said casting circle work.

"Miriel has, at some point, talked about it as a difference in understanding." Fredrick had said about an hour ago. "If you understand the magic, it will work."

I'm hoping that "understanding" doesn't mean what I think it means.

Well, either way. I have a wind tome now and I get to practice getting it to work.

I also have a…quill with some spirit dust-infused ink in case I want to write anything magical to this book.

Lissa gave them to me.

_She's a very nice girl._

Yes, yes she is.

…

Ok, here goes nothing.

The basic wind spell is…

Wind energy, whatever the fuck that is, concentrated on a single point and allowed to roam free.

…

Nope, no dice.

Hmm…

"Perhaps…" Fredrick starts to say.

Tuning him out. Sorry Fredrick.

…

I need to fire the wind spell as a ball.

There's some leeway in the definition of a "center" that the spell can use. So I can theoretically use a bullet as the center instead of just an ill-defined point.

…

Ok, target's over there…

Activate the circle.

…Yeah, that feels like wind, alright.

Firing missile, "push" it out of the hand.

…

"Wonderful! You have potential indeed, Ash." Fredrick says, smiling. I don't know if he knows that I tuned him out entirely so I'm afraid to say anything.

The target dummy is also wobbling.

"Your effort is most satisfactory." Miriel said from her seat near the edge of the barracks while Lissa claps happily. When did Miriel get here? "Even though the spell is too weak to be useful in direct combat, for you to have made such tremendous progress in such a short amount of time is exemplary."

True. The spell's current output is more like a parlor trick than a combat option.

So…how much can I afford to alter the spell?

"He's off in his own world again." I heard Lissa mutter, accompanied by what is most likely an exaggerated eye roll.

The basic spell is a ball of irregular wind energy focused around an ill-defined center.

Mine is a ball of irregular wind energy focused around an ill-defined but shaped, mentally concrete center.

_So what if the energy is not irregular instead?_

Let's check.

…

_What the active mind isn't registering is that he's now standing in the middle of the range training ground flipping through the wind tome in his hand while everyone around him either looks at him in open amusement or ignoring him with a small knowing smile on their faces._

…

Ok, I have some ideas. Let's try some more shots.

Concentrate, and…

Shots, two, three, four, away.

"As good as before, Ash." Miriel remarked.

…

Definitely felt force there. So this oddly defined wind energy is just…physical force. The concentration is a little odd, but it's just physical force. So if I were to regulate the energy instead it would do a lot better?

_Remember the animation for Elwind?_

It was all swirly and shaped like a tornado. Or was that Arcwind? Point is the higher spells were all swirly and organized and green and shit.

Pretty sure I can't do that, and the amount of energy required to spin that force over a false core would outweigh whatever benefits it would get.

_Also be pretty expensive for the tome construction, and if you wanted to do that..._

Then I would be better off buying an Elwind or Arcwind tome instead of trying to reinvent the wheel.

...

Well…so what if I place that energy behind a solid core?

A non-explosive driven bullet. There should be some pebbles around here…this should do, a piece of wood chip.

Except the wood chip is far from aerodynamic and just shoving energy behind it isn't going to do anything useful.

Fuck.

_Meanwhile Lissa has whispered "what is he doing?" to Miriel, who doesn't want to respond. Or couldn't, since I'm being stupid while standing in the MIDDLE OF THE ROOM_

Let's try a small stone instead. Let's try actually looking for a small stone instead…ah ha. Good enough.

So…

If I actually want to do this almost all of the energy needs to be concentrated behind the stone. Pretty sure the circle can't actually do that. What's the next best alternative without making a dedicated circle?

Making the radius on the ball of winds as small as physically (or magically, I guess) possible and making the center of said ball behind the actual stone.

Ok, let's give it a shot…shit, it's not going to do anything.

Open up book, grab quill. Uh…where's my cheat sheet?

…

_At this point I think Lissa's doing all of the "being embarrassed" for you, given the amount of facepalming she's doing. By the way a lot of mages are snickering at you._

_Hey. Active mind. You listening? HEY_

_LISTEN_

…

Ok, added in a little tibit. Spell effect is now delayed about a fraction of a second. Thank you Ricken for loaning me that spell component book, even if it seemed to have pages ripped out of it for some reason.

Let's try this out.

…

Well, I just have to fling the rock first.

Concentrate, spell radius should be as tight as possible, and…fire!

…

...

…

Whoo…wow, that was, uh, really loud.

Let's…check the target for damage…yeah...uh…

The pebble embedded itself into the wood post, but other than some chippings it didn't do a whole lot of damage.

Was still really damn loud though.

…

"How…how did you do that?" I hear Lissa say. When did she sneak up to me?

Also the room is now deathly quiet.

"Do…what?" I say, not really paying attention.

"That." She put her hand up to the embedded stone and rubbed it with a finger. "It's warm, too. What the heck?"

…

With a basic wind spell it accelerated that much?

_With a basic wind spell with zero optimization it accelerated that much?_

Holy shit, Fire Emblem's been holding out on me.

Imagine what I can do with this if the force is 100 percent concentrated behind the bullet instead of swirling around it.

"Scuse me, need a table and lots of paper." I say to Lissa, while gathering up the quill and ink on the ground.

_She's following you, by the way._

…

Ok, found a table. Set everything down, grab fresh piece of paper, copy the default circle.

I have to say I'm getting a lot better at drawing circles that are actually circular.

_And yet you still cheated with a mug._

The end justifies the means.

…

Uh…

Whose…hands…are those?

_Lissa's._

Uh…

I'm…just going to…not turn around…and concentrate on the task at hand. Yeah…

…

…

_So how's the whole "ignoring the hands on your shoulders" thing doing?_

Poorly.

But the general spell is finished.

"Wow, you can make spells already?" I hear Lissa say.

THE GIRL IS BREATHING DOWN MY NECK

_**A** GIRL IS BREATHING DOWN YOUR NECK_

"It's a proof of concept." I say. Reclusive people such as myself aren't good with personal space invasions. Even less so if it's by a cute girl ten years younger.

"What does that mean?" She says, backing up a tiny bit because my body language is clearly screaming in…mild discomfort.

"It means I don't have anything solid for a spell, but it shows what I want the spell to do, hopefully."

"I heard a loud noise; what happened?" Chrom said, walking in, and stopping for a brief moment because it looks like her sister is giving a shoulder massage to a potential insurgent in the army.

_You and your assumptions._

"Hey, brother! He's making spells!" Lissa says, bouncing over to Chrom.

"Really? I figured you for the scholarly type." Chrom said, walking over to peer at the paper.

I shrug. "Depends on if it works or not." I place one of the two pages I made into the tome, and leave the other one out to dry underneath a…

This is glass, right?

Underneath a glass pane.

"He calls it a proof of concept." Lissa continues.

"Interesting. And what concept, sir Ash, do you hope to prove?" Miriel said, stopping by the door.

"Something something." I say in response. Because I'm not sure what I'm trying to prove.

…

Back to the training field! This is taking a while!

"Ash, is this in preparation for the arena match?" Chrom asked, taking a seat on the edge of the practice range.

"No, not really. Which reminds me: are you going alone?"

"Ah, well, no. I'm allowed to have three others with me." Chrom said, a little caught off guard. "I thought you knew about that?"

In game it was six, including him, if I'm remembering this right. "Not really; I had thought it would've been a one on one."

Anyways, back on task. Must create super overpowered spell for the eventual god killing.

This new spell is…dust based. It will use dust and uber fast wind speeds to create blades of wind that will totally be awesome and shit.

_You didn't think this out did you._

Not to the part where the spell would actually be used, no.

_Including the part where dust is just too light to use as monomolecular cutters._

Yeah. Hey, I was distracted by Lissa, I have an excuse.

ANYWAYS…get some wood chips, let's make this shit work.

The wind magic creates a spiral effect around the wood, giving it a bullet-esque spin.

_You've never handled a firearm in your entire life._

I know the theory, and if all else fails I can re-understand it through the magic of trial and error.

Also included is a hold and fire trigger (not a usually used spell component because nobody sane wants to burn their hands off with their own spells) so I can hold a piece of wood, wrap it with spells, and then…take aim…fire!

…

That sound of wood on stone means I missed the target. It was...underwhelming.

"So, did you learn anything?" Chrom asked as soon as I lowered my arm.

"A little." I sigh. I learned that this would be easier if I used some needles instead of wood chips. Fuck aerodynamics.

...

Or nails. given how I'm going to propel an object using something with a fat bottom would work better.

…

_Remember that particular webcomic, where the concept of the "glass half full" was explored?_

The whole vacuum propelled glass thing?

_Think we can do that?_

Probably not…or at least not on a scale where it would be useful. Trying to build a mechanism that's reusable with currently available tech is probably expensive to the point of stupidity.

In any case, I'm better off using smooth objects for now with a spell like this.

_Or you could just not use this spell._

Or that.

…

"So, do you think it's possible to make a new healing spell? Miriel says it isn't." Lissa asked me during lunch.

About twenty seconds ago. Which means we're still having lunch.

"Uh…? You mean for me to make one?" I ask her. She nods.

"Depends; I don't know how healing spells work, so I can't really make it better." I shrug.

Lissa taps the ball on the tip of her staff in response, staring at it.

Besides, it's not like Recover staves are in short supply anywhere...right?

Lissa mulls it over with her lunch.

…

…

The afternoon was pretty much just more (orthodox) spell practice, until I can do it without needing to focus hard before shooting. Didn't see much of anyone else since I found an unused side room to practice in.

Apparently casting a spell without giving it enough power to deal damage doesn't burn out the tome. Something tells me this can be exploited.

…

…

"Hey! Ash!" I hear Robin call as I head down to dinner. "Come here a second!"

…

I go over, and note that she's…looking into a room?

"What's this about?" I ask her, peering into the room.

"They're the combatants we're going up against in the arena." Robin says.

Really.

Take a closer look…

…

There seems to be a serious lack of blue hair and mask.

Oh shit.

"Who's their best guy?" I ask Robin.

"A man by the name of Lon'qu. He's the one with the spiky black hair." She says, pointing to Lon'qu sitting in the middle.

So…

In story Lon'qu lost his spot to Lucina because Lucina was a girl and he instinctively seized up (more or less). If he's the contestant then…

Lucina either a. didn't make it in time somehow, or…she never came to this timeline to begin with.

…

Need to go ask.

This can get so bad so fast.

"Wait, where are you going?" Robin calls after me.

…

"Chrom."

I find him at dinner. He looks up from his food. "What do you need, Ash?"

Ah…really should have planned ahead. Fuck it, this is important.

"Back when you were attacked by the very first wave of Risen." He looks at me with a weird glint in his eyes. "What happened to you?"

"After the Risen showed up, we were attacked and barely managed to fend them off from within a nearby fortress until the Ylissean patrol showed up. Why do you ask?"

Shit, Lucina never showed up.

Oh so much shit.

"Nothing, just…uh, overthinking things." I pick a spot away from people and sit.

…

"Outrealmer, I believe you owe me some explanations." Robin showed up a few minutes later and singled me out almost immediately.

…

"I can't say." I shake my head. She refrains from slamming her hands on the table, and settled for clenching her fists until her knuckles turned white.

"You've been very straightforward before now, what's so different this time?" She demands in a low hiss.

"There are some serious inaccuracies between what I know about the world and what I'm experiencing." I say after thinking on it for almost a full minute. "And the magnitude of that difference is terrifying."

She clicks her tongue. "In other words you don't want to tell me."

"I don't want to tell any of you." I correct her, and feel her eyes burning through me.

"Oh really? Why?"

I sigh and lean in a bit. "Because right now I need to have every advantage I can get, until I hit some key points in the timeline."

One of her eyebrows go up. "Like what?"

...

Do I dare?

I dare.

...

"Like a certain umbrella-loving someone getting nabbed." I say.

Robin thinks it over for a few seconds then blink in comprehension. "And you want it to happen?"

"I want it to start. If it starts the way I know it should then we can freely finish it however we please."

Robin thinks it over. "What if something happens to her?"

"That's exactly why I don't want to say anything more than this; by default she's going to be fine." Wait.

Default means nothing. Maribelle is a pretty woman, a member of nobility, and going to be in the hands of people that hate what she represents. Doesn't take a goddamn genius to figure out what's going to happen to her outside of a game's script and the need to stay within the confines of a T rating.

Shit. In other words the odds of her getting out of her abduction without severe mental trauma is zero, regardless of how quickly Ricken can move.

_We are literally relying on the fact that Gangrel is batshit insane instead of vengeance driven, and just want her as a hostage and bait instead of...a trophy._

I guess my face exposed my thoughts, since Robin was looking at me with a progressively deeper frown. She then nods after a moment. "Whatever you think will happen, I expect a full briefing once it occurs."

"Yeah, sure." I am not focused anymore.

…

Robin leaves to get food.

Let's...let's stay focused on what's going to happen now.

_What's going to happen at this point?_

I know, or, rather, I have a fair amount of reason to believe that Laurent has made it across, so it's entirely possible that my entrance into the picture has changed things for the different.

_It certainly has for Maribelle._

_..._

...Shit, this means Chrom and Emmeryn are in danger during the assassination mission, as well as chapter 13.

_Your eyes reporting: Robin's got her food and sat across from Lissa. Lissa apparently asked her something and Robin's response was accompanied by a lot of hand motions and possible eye rolling. Either way Lissa's shooting you a lot of worried looks._

What else is going to change because Lucina is, at the very least, missing for this stage?

_Let's not get ahead of ourselves._

Fact: She's not competing.

_Opinion: She didn't make it across the dimension/time travel._

…

Point taken.

Ok, calming down a little now.

"Yo!" I hear someone as he accidentally knock my face into the table.

"Hi Vaike." That really hurt, man.

"Sorry, sorry. You just seemed so down and I wanted to cheer you up." He says with a wide grin. "You're too mopey, y'know? Laugh a little."

"Yeah, yeah." I'm a little preoccupied with all of the possible variations that might have occurred because Lucina's no longer with the time table, so forgive me if I end up ignoring you, Vaike.

"Huh. You're like Miriel, only without the big words." Vaike mutters to himself. "Well, if you need help, Sir Vaike here will be glad to help!" He says, with a confident, cocky grin and a thumb pointing to himself.

"Sure thing. Thanks." I smile a tiny bit. He claps me on the shoulders and walks away, and then stops to chat with Chrom.

…

Ugh.

Right. Any time spent worrying should be used preparing instead.

I'll find some way of protecting Maribelle when the time comes.

And I'll sub for Lucina when her role needs to be played, if she's not around.

Not the blood relation to Chrom part. That would just be terrifying.

…

Speaking of Chrom, seems like he just got a message. The messenger is speaking in his ear, and apparently it's pretty important.

Chrom just got up and left and more or less abandoned his plate.

_To be fair his plate is pretty much empty._

What gives?

_Follow him?_

Follow him.

…

…

Oh, it's Sumia.

I guess Sumia would be important.

Turns out that showing up late for the chapter means the border guard won't let her pass, so Chrom had to vouch for her position in the Shepherds.

On one hand this feels like a wasted plot point.

On the other hand she's safe and sound and perfectly a Pegasus Knight (if a little snow-logged and cold).

_Because obviously her importance as a plot point trumps her safety as a human being._

Why was she late though?

…

Given the sudden change of color of her cheeks Chrom apparently asked the same question.

She mumbles something that Chrom didn't catch, so he leans in closer. Enough time for me to get closer into hearing range too.

"I got lost in the snow." She says, barely loud enough for us to catch. Chrom sighs.

_You know what could've happened had she been more lost, right?_

She would've frozen to death. Yeah, not gonna laugh about that.

"Do you feel ok?" I ask her. I'm no doctor though.

"Yeah, why?" Sumia replies, looking at me a little oddly. Chrom apparently shares her confusion.

Uh…These people know about hypothermia, right? Most definitely, since the other Pegasus Knights were carrying spare blankets and stuff.

"Just worried; I don't think your armor's very protective against cold."

She looks down at the leather armor she's wearing. "I felt a little cold but I'm fine now." She smiles.

She's not shivering or anything, just wet and melty.

_There's something wrong about that description._

"I see Ash's point; have Lissa take a look at you later, alright?" Chrom says.

Sumia does a cute little bow. "Yes, my lord." Chrom's eyebrows twitch in what I'm assuming is frustration. He is a "let's all be friends" kind of lord, after all.

…

Five minutes later when we're resting in…what is passably a lounge (a fireplace, table, chairs. So I guess it's more of a meeting room than a lounge, but meh) Chrom finds a reason to talk to me.

"Ash, I know you're an Outrealmer; how much do you know?"

I assume he doesn't mean about his future.

"What subject are we talking about?"

"Well…let's say, farming." Chrom says with a wave of his hand.

Uh…

Not much?

_You spend all your time on TVtropes, safe to say you know nothing but useless trivia._

I played Harvest Moon. Potatoes grow after seven days.

_Oh for the love of_

"Not a whole lot; what kind of…farming plans is being used by Ylisse right now?"

"Why is that important?" Chrom sounds surprised.

"It isn't. I just need to get a frame of reference."

"Well, uh…" Chrom scratches his chin and looks off to a spot in a corner of the room.

_He doesn't know does he._

"I have to admit it's not something I paid much attention to." He finally admits, after having gone steadily redder while he was stalling for time.

I shrug. "It's alright; in my case, I'm largely familiar with concepts and not how to actually make them happen."

_Non-sequitor: You're older than Chrom. By a lot._

"Like...?" Chrom says hesitantly.

"Like, say, Slash and Burn, crop rotation, fertilization, yadda yadda. Concepts and ideas."

"I see." Chrom then falls silent.

Uhm…conversation, conversation…

"Out of curiosity, why did you ask?" There we go.

"Ah, well…Emm has been pretty insistent about me knowing a couple of things." He said, just as awkward as before. "And, well…" His eyes changed. "Given what has happened around here the people could use any advantage they can get."

The Risen, exploding earth, and near constant zombie attacks? Yeah, I can see why you'd think like that.

I stroke my chin for time. "Well, once things settle down I do a survey around Ylisse; I'm not quite sure how much help I'll be but it'll be a start."

He frowns slightly. "Can't you just access the documents in the castle? Wouldn't that be faster?"

_Yes._

But then again, at no point in any nation has there been such a thing as "too little corruption".

"Well, it would, I suppose." I say, not meeting his eyes.

He shrugs. "Sorry; it was just an idea."

I wave it off.

And then Lissa comes in.

"Hey Chrom! Oh hi Ash." She says with her characteristic bright grin. "Chrom, Vaike's going nuts at the barracks."

Chrom sighed. "Of course. I'll be there in a moment." He looks at me, I shrug. And then he gets up and leaves.

"What were you two talking about?" Lissa asks with a wry smile on her face.

"Farming." I deadpan.

"Booring." Lissa rolls her eyes and struts out.

…

Welp, let's read a little more before bedtime.

…

…

_And your last idea tonight is…_

Wind shield. Spin the wind conically around the focal point fast enough and it should deflect arrows.

_Keyword being should. Feel like testing that right now?_

Uh…

Y'know what? I'm feeling a bit tired so I'm gonna just go to bed now bye

…

…

…

_Hey. It's morning. Feel like testing that spell yet?_

Breakfast time

_HEY_

_…_

"Ash! Good timing." Chrom says the instant I walk into the…what do you call it?

_Dining hall? Mess hall? Food place?_

Food place sounds good.

"What did I miss?"

"We're going over the rosters one last time." Robin said, munching on a slice of bread. "It's going to be Chrom, Vaike, Miriel, and me." She points to each person with her bread as she ticked off each name. "Want a spot instead?"

"Nope." I shake my head.

Robin shrugs. "Spineless." She says with a smirk.

I shrug in response. "I'll watch from the sidelines, thanks."

Chrom nods. "Alright, if there are no objections, then we'll head down to the arena."

So I overslept? Bummer.

_Grab some bread to eat on the go?_

Looks like it.

…

…

Ah ha. The arena even has bleachers. Nifty.

Although I'm technically pretty late so front row seats are kind of hard to come by.

…

Who else is here, anyways? This is an arena inside a fortress.

_At what point did you think this was a fortress?_

When this was a border wall with Ylisse. I guess there would be a town attached that supports the garrison, huh…either way, the only people I see in the arena are off-duty soldiers.

_At what point did you recognize them as off duty soldiers?_

Meh, it's not important.

_HEY_

…

Ah ha. Lucky front row seat, next to…guy wearing large, face obscuring hoodie. No, not creepy at all.

"Excuse me, is that seat taken?" I say to the person.

He looks at me and flinches.

Flinches?

Before slightly shaking his head, so I'm good to sit.

_Wonder why he flinched, though?_

…

And the two sides walk into the arena a few minutes later accompanied by ungodly loud cheering.

I still remember when I thought my 3DS was broken before I realized that the arena stage actually had ambient noise in the form of the onlookers.

Good times.

The two sides meet in the center…

Chrom draws his Falchion, Lon'qu (probably Lon'qu, but it's too far to see a face from here) draws a sword, probably a steel one.

Vaike faces off against a Spear wielder.

Robin faces off against an Axe wielder.

Miriel in the back, but she's probably going to be occupying the archer.

…

On one hand we have total weapon triangle advantage, but on the other hand it feels like the other side purposefully chose these match ups.

Also it's less of a free for all and more of a "four one-on-ones happening at the same time."

Annd…

They're off!

_Who are we watching first?_

Vaike just charges shoulder-first into the spear wielder, knocking the poor guy away.

Vaike's a lot faster than I gave him credit for, wow.

The spear guy recovered his footing and counters with spear stabs.

Which Vaike either parries or dodges, but the two aren't making any more progress towards each other.

…

Robin's being physically overwhelmed by the axe guy, to nobody's surprise. Also the axe guy is cheating and going fisticuffs instead of using his axe.

_And Robin's shooting lightning out of her fingertips. I say the two sides are even._

The axe user is probably at an advantage though; Robin's being forced to almost exclusively counter due to the axe user's attacks and maneuvers, and she's not really landing a hit or getting close enough to be hit. She also can't break away far enough to properly use her tome, so she's stuck just shooting sparks at the guy.

…

Next is…

Miriel and the Archer are having a medieval-magic-ish-shoot-out-thing.

_What a masterful description._

She's constantly defending herself by using wind to bat arrows out of the way.

The archer is shooting fast enough (and with surprising accuracy) to stop Miriel from actually burning his ass to near-death.

…

Lon'qu and Chrom are…evenly matched.

Not as thematically awesome as the Chrom vs Lucina cutscene, but evenly matched all the same.

Lon'qu is generally faster with both his footwork and his swings, but he doesn't attack as often and prefers to hang back until the opportunity for counters show up.

Chrom on the other hand...has no issue going balls to the walls and just charge at Lon'qu most of the time. Goes without saying he's also aggressive as hell and his swings are large, exaggerated, and still forces Lon'qu to dodge them because there's just so much power behind them.

…

Man, it's hard keeping track of four fights at the same time, especially if you can't focus on them long enough to see anything.

_Don't try to get a blow-by-blow analysis then._

…

Robin's the first to break deadlock.

She charges into Axes with a shoulder charge like Vaike, but the difference in speed and weight means she kinda bounces off of him.

_Axes?_

I don't know who he is, so I'm calling him Axes.

_Sheesh._

Anyways, Axes brings his axe for an overhead swing, but Robin spins out of the way with her sword sticking out, cutting his armor. He then jumps back slightly for a sideways axe attack and then…

She steals my move!

_She modified it._

Robin keeps close to the Axe man and blocks his swinging arm (upper part) with the flat of her blade. She then elbows Axes in the face (with her sword arm), which knocks him off balance, and then grabs his throat with her left hand for a weak-thunder finish.

Axes is now on the ground and trembling. He tries to stand for a few seconds, before giving up and lying down on the ground.

Good going, girly.

…

Ok, the dude sitting next to me is making me uncomfortable; I think I'm being watched.

_Should've picked a quieter seat then._

…

Well, let's sit back a little and…watch the hooded man look at the fight out of the corner of my eyes.

…

He's either really damn buff or that robe is huge.

…

His head isn't moving a whole lot, which means he's focusing hard on one particular fight...

Or not looking at the fight at all.

…

He seems to be following the Chrom fight. Hmm…

"He's pretty good, isn't he?" I say suddenly. The man flinches because that's a horrible way to start a conversation. "The man with the giant sword, I mean."

The hooded man nods after a moment.

…

Did I just imagine that?

Because I just saw a wisp of blue.

_That would make him…_

Yeah.

"Beg pardon, but…" I lean in a bit closer. "Would you happen to know someone by the name of Lucina?"

…

Well, I almost got shanked for my troubles. She's a little bit jumpier than normal.

_Probably has something to do with you._

But she turned to look at me, and…yeah, that's the mask. Her hair's tucked into her clothes, right? They're…

Yeah if the game wasn't dependent on illustrations and modellers there would have been zero chance of her pretending to be a dude without cutting her pretty, pretty hair.

_Um._

I'm a sucker for long hair. Now shut up, trying to talk to savior of mankind.

"Yep, looks like it." I say after her hand has stopped trying to draw something from her clothes.

She doesn't respond, and only stare at me with…what can only be described as a blend of sheer fury and abject terror.

Do I look that bad?

_You could be in the future, you know._

…

Oh.

Oh that's a good point.

If she's looking at me like that then it's entirely possible I jumped off the slippery slope and went into all-out evil mode at some point.

Hmm…

Well, only one way to find out.

"Then again, maybe I'm just tired." I mutter, before standing up and leaving.

Last glimpse I catch of the fight is Vaike charging into Spears before Spears went for a groin attack with the fortunately not-stabby part of the spear.

…

Leave the arena, walk down a fairly straight and deserted hallway…

…

Are those footsteps behind me?

_Don't turn around and check or anything._

Well, let's hope it is. Continue walking normally.

Corner…corner is…right here.

Walk beyond the corner, stand a little out of how long I think her arms are, and wait.

…

…

And now I'm staring down the Falchion's tip, how wonderful.

Wow that sword is terrifying when you're on the wrong end of it.

"How." Lucina hisses. Her hood has come down, and what I can see of her face implies that she isn't happy.

"How…what?" I say after I calm down enough from seeing a sword pointed inches from my face.

"How are you here?" She snarls. The Falchion is actually trembling.

"I have no idea what you're talking about." I say, tripping over my words a little.

I'm really regretting not carrying a spell book at this point.

"Don't fuck with me!" She almost yells.

...

_Future you taught her poorly._

Apparently.

...

I sigh. I'm not going to bluff my way out of this. "I didn't come from the future, if that's what you're asking."

Her sword goes down a fraction of an angle.

"Is future me really that bad?" I ask her.

No response.

_You would be the kind to slip straight into felony territory as soon as the arms of the law get eaten by vapor zombies._

Not helping my case, brain.

"Uh…can we talk? I think we should talk." I'm grasping at straws here.

The Falchion is trembling a lot. What gives?

…

Is…is she crying?

_Remember the part about how she had to restrain from leaping at her daddy Chrom? Maybe you weren't a total jackass in all of her memory._

I touch the Falchion, and find no resistance, so I push the blade out of the way.

"Are you ok?" I ask her.

Lucina seems to get a grip on where she is, since she took several deep breaths to calm herself and lowered the Falchion all the way to the ground.

"Sir, it's good to know that you're back to normal."

And then she gasps in surprise and tries to bring the Falchion into my face again.

_Normal, eh?_

"So that means future me is somehow less normal than I am now." I sigh. "It would help a lot of you could explain to me what's going on."

After a long moment of consideration, Lucina nods in response and sheathes the Falchion.

_So how much experience do you get for talking a time-travelling princess out of prematurely ending her supposed evil superior?_

Hopefully more than she'd get for gutting me.

…

"Where should I start…" Lucina says after trying and failing to find a good place to start for the past few minutes.

_You're on a time limit._

Noted.

"When did I become hated?" I ask.

She's obviously uncomfortable with the question. "When I turned seven and…father died."

I was never that loyal to begin with, so I don't think that was the only reason.

That also means Chrom didn't die during the duel between him and…malnourished dark elf. What's-his-face.

Validar.

"You were…upset, at the news." That sounds like an understatement. "Especially when Ylisse was given to the council of nobles to rule."

…

I'm apparently very pro-monarchy in the future.

_Said council could've been corrupt._

…

"There was another reason, wasn't there?" I say after a moment.

She nods. "You had recently gotten married."

_Parsing…_

I got married five years after the game ended.

_…Good effort?_

"Shortly after the council of nobles was established, your, uh…" She gulps.

I can see where this is going.

"I get the idea." I hold up a hand. No point making her recall horrific memories.

She nods. "Since she was attacked within the walls of Ylisstol, the nobles blamed you for being lax on the garrison; there were talks of having you imprisoned."

_Wow, what? And they thought that would work?_

"And I went nuts afterward?" I say, fake-lightly. I would go nuts afterward; that's a moronically unfair judgment on their part.

She nods. "You killed the council in retaliation and took control over Ylisse." Lucina then took a calming breath. "You were…harsh, as a ruler, and universally hated."

_Yay?_

"But you kept the country alive while everyone else was buried by the Risen." She continued. "Until we had to resort to…well, this."

Time travel by Naga.

…

_Might not be a good idea to ask just how harsh you were._

I can be pretty vicious if I go on tilt, especially after…especially after losing both a newlywed wife and an unborn child, and then be blamed for it.

Yeah. I think it would be enough to set anyone off.

…

We sat in silence until we heard the cheering of the audience. I sigh, getting her attention.

"No point worrying about that now; you're here for a job, right?" She cocks her side, and then nods. "Cool; do your thing."

She gets up to leave.

"Oh, just one more thing." She stops to listen to me. "What was my goal?"

"Your goal? To kill Grima." Lucina says, and then puts on her hood and leaves, mixing right into the people coming out of the arena.

_So the future you failed._

Looks like it.

_And Robin wasn't there to be a sacrifice._

And Chrom wasn't there to seal it.

Shit.

_So what are the victory conditions we have?_

One, have Chrom deal the final blow.

Two, have Robin deal the final blow.

Three, blow the shit out of Grima when it shows up with conventional weaponry. Somehow.

_Need to research nitroglycerin for that to happen._

…

One and a half: test to see if Lissa can wield the Falchion, despite not having a brand.

_Likely to fail._

Two and a half: kill Robin.

_Probably with hired assassins since Robin's a Friend. But this doesn't solve the problem of Grima still existing._

Three and a half: develop laser and rocket technology and kill Grima via Orbital Satellite Laser System.

_How do you plan to do that one?_

Details, details.

.

.

.

{ === + === }

I think this is the first time we stopped at a time other than sleepy time.

Which I think qualifies for some kind of irony since this is posting about five minutes before I head off to bed.


	6. From - The Longfort (2)

But before we can carry out glorious plans of annihilating an overgrown dragon down to molecules…

The arena match still has to resolve.

Which reminds me: I should probably not be missing right now.

_Get back to the others?_

Ayep.

…

I step into the waiting area for the good guys (us) and

"Ahh! Ash! You missed the end!"

The first thing that greets me is Lissa's pouting.

"Sorry, sorry. So I guess we won then?"

Lissa was busy patching up everyone's minor cuts. "Yep! Chrom knocked the other guy into a wall!" And Lon'qu's still alive? He's tougher than I thought.

"I saw the man sitting next to you leave shortly after you did; did something happen?" Robin asks.

Oh yeah. She's sharp.

"Oh really? Wonder why that was." I say as offhandedly as I can manage.

_Not going to lie about it?_

At no point will lying about the interaction happening be a good idea. Better to just pretend that it didn't happen.

Robin frowns a tiny bit, but let the matter drop.

"So what's going to happen now?" I ask Chrom.

"Now? You have your alliance." I hear a voice behind me. That must be…

Hello, uh…guy I never use because you show up way too late in the game.

"And who might you be?" Fredrick asks.

"I'm the Khan you just put out of power, lads." The man laughs. "Western Khan Basilio, nice to meet all of ya."

Fredrick immediately checks himself. "My apologies, sir, I had not-"

Basilio waves him off. "Not a problem. So what did you guys want out of this alliance anyways?"

"Military support against the Risen that have been appearing everywhere." Chrom said with a testing flex of his arm.

Basilio growls. "You're giving free access into Ylisse for our troops?"

Fredrick scowls. Did they not think this through?

Chrom nods. "Our two countries have had good standings for a long time. I, at least, trust you."

A laugh comes from behind us. I guess that would be…

Yes, Flavia.

Y'know, I always thought the two were together from the beginning.

_Nevermind them having no support levels with each other from the beginning._

"And your trust is well placed, prince. We'll make the arrangements shortly for our anti-Risen parties." Flavia says with a wide, wide grin.

I think there's like a million taunts waiting for Basilio when we leave.

"While we're on the subject of the Risen." Basilio waves a hand, and…Lon'qu walks over. From a solid wall.

…How the fuck did he do that?

"Take Lon'qu with you. His strength is more useful out in the field than hanging about here." Basilio says with a grin. Lon'qu does a slight bow.

"I see. Thank you both." Chrom says gratefully.

Oh, wait. Take a peek at Lissa…

Ooh, she's staring at Lon'qu. She's trying to stare without being overt.

Must not grin. Must not grin. Must not grin…

…

"What are you doing?" Robin asks me.

I turn away. Not grinning is hard.

…

…

After the arena match is the official ceremony for Flavia's ascension as the…what did they call it?

Oh well.

As the King Khan.

_That is sad._

He he he.

Anyways, Flavia's now the King Khan (or Queen Khan, I suppose) and her first order of business is to forge a military alliance between Ferox and Ylisse.

Unfortunately for us we don't get to stick around for the after party.

…

Which means I get to ride back home to Ylisstol with Lissa while she sulks about missing the banquet.

…

…

Soon enough, we come upon the…oh wow.

Yeah, the game really does glaze over the minor skirmishes with Risen that occurs.

A few Risen is savaging the remains of a few dead travellers.

Lon'qu, by virtue of riding alone, charges forward with his sword raised.

And then he rides straight into the Risen and cuts them down amazingly fast.

…

Out of the corner of my eye I see Robin take out her notebook and scribble furiously.

And then I hear a sigh from a girl sitting a foot or so away from me.

_And then your idiotic grin returns to your face._

…

"The extent of damage is worse than I thought." Chrom mutters after we pass by the umpteenth burned field.

"Between the Risen and the bandits, the village militia won't do anything." I mutter.

"What makes you think there would be bandits?" Lissa asks, leaning back into me for (I think) moral support.

"Mass confusion, no standing military, poor training…if I were a bandit I would be having a blast." I say.

Lissa says nothing.

…

One advantage to our return path: we cross a village for the night instead of camping out.

…

On Robin's suggestion, we the Shepherds decided to stay up late to wait for the inevitable rain of Risen.

…

Which goes over pretty well, since the giant glowing eyes in the sky popped up before midnight.

Welp, time to magic my way out of this.

The amount of Risen that fell into the village is…five.

The amount of Risen that fell outside is…a number bigger than five.

Chrom and Vaike are at the village square.

Robin and Miriel are at the walls. Or rather, the odd mixture of stone and wood that passes as the village walls.

Fredrick and Lon'qu are at the gate.

Sumia is guarding Lissa, flying low over the village buildings.

And I'm…I get to do whatever the fuck I want. Awesome.

Draw sword. First Risen…sighted. Sword user, Mercenary type. Did he see me?

Does he see? The Risen have way too much variance in their detection abilities.

Wave my sword at him.

Risen's sword comes up and he walks towards me. So I did get his attention. Awesome.

I feel bad for you, Undead Vapor Zombie man.

Undead Shambling Vapor Zombie man.

_How many qualifiers can you fit into one description?_

If only because I don't fight fair.

Here's a blast of highly concentrated wind aimed at your shins.

You're now on the ground, so all I gotta do is…

Concentrate…and…

STAB through the core.

_Kick them while they're down._

Second Risen…has heard the commotion?

It's running at me at full speed regardless.

Blast of wind into your chest.

_Risen is now no longer charging._

Blast of wind aimed at your shins again.

_Risen is now no longer standing._

Stab through the core.

_Risen is now no longer un-living._

I like this spell. It's nice.

…

Third Risen…fell to Chrom slicing it to pieces.

Fourth Risen died to Miriel lighting all of it on fire.

Fifth Risen…is unaccounted for.

Shit.

"Robin! Where did the fifth one fall to?" I shout at her.

"That way!" She says, pointing in a general direction and illuminating her finger with a small puff of fire.

I run in the direction she points to just as I hear her direct Sumia to assist me.

…

Did I ever mention how much night fighting sucks?

The village has more or less turned in for the night (or hiding in fear, one of the two) so the amount of light that's available on the street is minimal to the point of nonexistent, with the bright areas being the village square, which I just ran away from.

_And now you're trying to chase down a zombie in a dark alley._

The amount of thought I placed into this course of action is remarkable.

Oh well. Milk has been spilled, so now it's time to smile while cleaning it up.

_That adage doesn't work very well adapted, does it._

No, no it doesn't.

Now where is that little fucker?

"Sir!" I hear someone call behind me. Followed by footsteps, and glorious, glorious light.

_Praise the torch!_

Some villagers have grabbed spears, though they omitted their pot helmet. "We want to help, sir. What should we do?"

I will never get over the fact that I'm technically a ranking officer. Also their spears are like just sticks.

"One of the bastards fell over there." I point into the oddly run-down batch of houses. "We're going to sweep the houses one by one kill it."

"Sir, those houses have been abandoned for a while now." The man said, obviously not liking the idea of going into said houses.

"Good, so we won't need to worry about any casualties." I look at their…faces of mixed emotions. They want to help but at the same time they want to live. Makes sense. "Look through the houses in teams of three. Don't let each other out of sight. If you see the Risen, yell for help even if you think you can kill it."

I take a deep breath. "It's vital that all of you survive; don't take any unnecessary chances."

The militia leader's doubt and confusion is replaced by fierce determination.

Is that really all it took? These guys have pretty low opinions of Ylissean nobility if a "don't die" is all it took to rally them.

_They might just have low opinions of the Ylissean army, since these guys should still remember the order to "kill everything Plegian."_

Point taken.

"Go." They nod, disperse in teams of three, and begin systematically sweeping the houses.

…

I hear wings over my head.

"Ash, I'm here to help." Sumia said, passing down a torch to me from her perch on her Pegasus.

"Wonderful. Keep an eye on us up there."

"Huh?" Sumia said, about to land besides me. "You don't want me here?"

"Your eyes are more useful in the sky than on the ground. There's a militia force here; help them too."

She nods. "Be careful." She then takes off into the sky, flying fairly low over the houses.

Ok…

I just sent away someone who can watch my back in favor of searching through dark, abandoned houses for a monster that could literally kill me with a single hit.

My priorities seem to be in check.

…

House one…clear, nothing in here except spiders and cobwebs.

House two…nada.

House three…clean. Although some upturned furniture and scraps of…stuff, shows signs of something or someone being here recently.

"We found it!" I hear someone yell, and dash out of the house.

Sumia had perched her Pegasus on top of the house, so I know where to run to.

Run run run

…

The lone Risen (a Myrmidon type, by the looks of it; no weapon though) is batting wildly at the three guys pointing their shaky little sticks in its direction.

Fortunately it doesn't seem to want to collide into said shaky little sticks.

_Which implies a sense of self preservation._

Which is bad for us.

Welp, party trick number one, coming right up. Pick out a dagger…

"Get back!" One of the men suddenly shout.

The Risen lunges forward and collide with one of the guys trying to contain it. Said Risen now has a stick in its stomach, but its lack of digestive system means it doesn't care.

_The Risen is about to savage the man, by the way._

I know. Focus…focus…

_The Risen has sunk a claw into the man's face. He's now screaming in pain._

Now!

I "push" the dagger with the strongest wind bullet I can make.

The Risen reels back, so that's probably a hit.

The Risen stands up and roars at the source of the dagger, aka me.

So before he notices that the guy he was savaging was pulled away…

Charge into his face!

…

Or Sumia could jump down from her Pegasus and run it through vertically THROUGH THE FUCKING HEAD. That works too.

She literally jumped down with her spear point driving into the top of its skull. The spear's now stuck in the ground and Sumia's jumping around in a little bit of pain.

"What were you thinking?" I ask her once I rushed up to the Risen, who was still struggling despite the fact that it was now forced to stand up straight because a spear has connected its brain to its ass. "Nevermind that. Are you ok?"

Sumia looks a little dazed and in pain. Considering she more or less jumped down the combined height of a house and a horse I'm not the least surprised.

"Yeah. I'm not as used to the whole jumping thing as Chrom." She says apologetically.

Wait, wait. You can train for that?

The Risen hasn't stopped struggling. Let's stop that right now.

Focus on its core…get behind him, and strike!

My aim is getting better.

_You've hit three non-moving targets._

Still getting better.

I shake my head. Small wonder Cynthia is so gung-ho, if her mother could do things like this. "Militia! Get your man and this lady to the cleric." I then remembered I have no idea where Lissa is.

"Where did you drop Lissa?"

"At the town square; Vaike took a hit and needed to be patched up." Sumia said, contemplating her spear which was stuck in the ground.

I sigh. "Ok then, get to the town square." I look at the spear, now devoid of Risen since it vanished. "Can we turn this spear into a monument?"

Sumia looks at me, confused.

The villagers look at me, confused.

I grin. "It's the place where an angel came and struck down evil."

Sumia blushes. I think. It's hard to tell in the torchlight.

The villagers cheer and laugh, even the guy that got clawed in the face.

_He's also kind of bleeding profusely so a little urgency would be nice._

…

"I heard from Miriel that you were a spell maker. Was what you did there one of the spells you made?" Sumia asked.

"The thing with the dagger? Kind of." I shrug; the dagger I threw lodged into the Risen's body and had vanished along with the Risen.

"You were not a mage before you joined the shepherds, correct?"

"I…yeah, I wasn't." Not much chance of using magic in the real world.

_Sufficiently advance science…_

Yeah, yeah. We're not that sufficiently advanced yet.

"Then you've learned to do all this so quickly…I find that amazing." Sumia smiles at me. I can see why she's number one on Chrom's wife list; that smile is endearing.

I shrug, because I'm not sure what to say in response.

…

"Ash, Sumia. Did…what happened?" Chrom said, looking a tad panicky when he saw Sumia come down from her Pegasus with a little stumble.

"Sumia heroically murdered a Risen." I say with a wide grin on my face.

Chrom looks at me confused. "Is…is that so, uh…"

Sumia's just quite a bit blushy while Lissa looks after the guy with the profusely bleeding facial damages.

_So in a sense they're both red in the face._

Yeah. That's...actually pretty correct.

…

With the immediate threat handled, all of us Shepherds go back to the inn to sleep.

On the way, I heard Chrom mutter about how the Feroxi troops can't come in fast enough.

…

[Next day]

…

"Sir, I think there's something you should know." A man says to me, complete with what he thinks is an Ylissean military salute.

Actually it's Scarface. Lissa's healing worked wonders on keeping him from actually dying from the wound, but now he's got three jagged scars running across his cheek to show for it.

Compared to dying, looking unspeakably badass is a pretty good tradeoff.

"What?" I ask him.

"The Risen were apparently attacking someone else last night."

…

Well, that's new.

He bows. "I'm sorry that I couldn't have told you sooner."

I wave his excuse away. "You were bleeding and dying; so who were they attacking?"

"Well, uh…she's still in that house. I think she's still sleeping."

She?

_Well, let's go see._

"Alright; let's go take a look."

…

It's a good thing the house is marked with Sumia's spear or it would've been really hard to find.

"Why are these houses so run down?" I ask the man. Dale, I think he said his name was.

"Sir. These houses belonged to people that died during the first Risen attack."

"I see."

And any subsequent attacks plus lack of general population flow means there's zero incentive to fix up a house that's not going to be used.

Anyways…door…door…the Risen bashed through this door during the night. So it's just door hinges.

Rooms…

Staircase that's utterly trashed…

More rooms…

Ah ha. Bundle of dirty robes.

Poke.

Poke again.

"Hey. Wake up."

The bundle stirs.

"Good morning…oh, you're not them." The girl (definitely a girl) said groggily.

"Who?" I ask her.

"Lloyd and Linus." She rolls back over to sleep some more.

…

_Parsing._

…

WHOA WAIT WHAT

"Who are they?" Dale asks.

"My brothers." The girl mumbles into her clothes.

"That would make you Nino. Are you Nino?" I ask her. This is weird.

"Hi." She's still mumbling into her clothes.

…

I didn't figure Nino for a heavy sleeper.

Uh…what do I do now?

"Nino, where are you right now?" I ask her.

"Here."

...

_What were you expecting?_

…

" 'Here' is a country called Ylisse." Dale says helpfully. The man knows what I'm up to.

The bundle of cloth finally stirs. "What's that?"

I wish I had some caffeine.

"Not Bern." I say.

_That _gets her attention. Nino shot up to her feet, and then stumbles a little because her oversized travel robes got under her feet.

Her hood falls down while she's struggling for footing, revealing her bright green hair.

"Is she the Speaker?" Dale breathes.

The only other person in all of Awakening that has green hair is Tiki.

This could get really ugly really quick, although it does kind of explain why the Risen wanted to kill her.

Nino finally got her footing and sheds her robes, revealing her…I don't know if those count as her game clothes, but I think they look similar enough: a white dress with blue top.

No cape though, which interesting, since it makes her look absolutely tiny. I think she's actually tinier than Lissa.

"Oh! Hello!" She says with a bright smile.

…

So narcolepsy aside she's a bundle of energy. Interesting.

"Yes, hi. Do you know where you are now?" I ask her (again?)

"Uhm…" She looks around. Not gonna lie: that skirt length is going to get her into a lot of trouble.

_And the green hair won't?_

"You said something about Bern?" She says with a light blush.

_How much listening would you do if you were deep asleep and some guy just came in and started to question you?_

Point taken.

"Yeah. We're not in Bern." I sigh. I don't even know if this Nino is "real" or not.

Her face falls. "I fell asleep waiting for my brothers and…now I'm here." She grumbles.

…

"All things considered you're pretty calm about this." I say, perhaps a tad hypocritically.

Nino mulls things over for a brief moment, and then shrugs with a big smile.

"Everything will be alright." She says confidently.

…

"Sir, is that girl related to the speaker?" Dale asks, having deduced that Nino wasn't Tiki.

"No, I don't think so." I shake my head.

"Who's the speaker?" Nino asks curiously.

"A girl that shares your hair color." I reply.

Nino tugs a little at her hair. "Huh. Do I get to meet her?"

…

Oh, right.

I pull off my money pouch. There's like, 50 gold there.

"Dale, catch."

He does, and looks at me quizzically.

"It's not much, but you deserve it; courage and determination should be rewarded. Thank you for saving this girl."

Dale seems to contemplate looking inside, but thinks against it and accepts the gold with a small smile.

….

We decided that the run down house is probably not the best place to interrogate a little girl, so the three of us leave and join up with the main group.

…

"Ash, who's that behind you?" Robin asks upon seeing the honestly not very conservatively dressed Nino bounce behind me.

Yes, she's not walking, she's bouncing.

"Perhaps she is related to the speaker?" Fredrick says.

"Who?" Robin asks.

"The Speaker for Naga. Supposedly she too is a lady with bright green hair." Fredrick looks at Nino. "Although I have to admit, I don't think the speaker is this young."

"Hey! I'm 14!" Nino sounds a little bit indignant about being called young.

"Then no, they're not related. The speaker is like a thousand years old." VAIKE, of all people, pitches in.

Also dude Tiki's way older than that.

"Ash, who is she?" Robin asks for clarification.

"I'm Nino, thank you very much." Nino huffs.

"Yes, nice to meet you, Nino. Who is she?" Robin said impatiently, adding the last bit for me.

"Hey!" Nino doesn't enjoy being ignored.

_Who would?_

"She's a girl we found in the abandoned section of the village." I say.

Robin sighs. "That's wonderful, but…?"

I feel like I'm being fished for information. "But…what? What kind of answer are you expecting?"

"What is she…to you?" Robin asks.

"A girl we found in a house…what are you trying to ask?" I am very, very confused at this point.

"Bright green hair isn't exactly a common occurrence around here." Robin says with finality.

Oh…she thinks Nino's an Outrealmer.

"I'm from Bern." Nino says.

"I don't know what that is." Robin deadpans.

Out of the corner of my eye…Fredrick seems to at least recognize the name.

"This is going nowhere fast." I scratch my head. "Long story short: Nino here was targeted by the Risen. I think we should take her with us."

"What?" I hear multiple people say (something to that effect). Nino included.

"I can handle myself." Nino pouts.

"Taking her along with us would put us at a disadvantage, Ash." Miriel cautions me. "If she is being targeted as you imply…"

"Then leaving her alone will just get her killed." I look at her. "How long do you think it'll take before a village decides that the girl with the bright green hair is too much trouble and throw her out?"

Silence.

"I can handle myself!" Nino insists.

I turn to her. "With what?"

She looks down at her belt.

"Oh." Her face fell. "Damn."

_Linus should watch his language around his little sister._

"I don't think the nobles will be very pleased at us bringing what they think is a foreign…well…" Fredrick says, trailing off.

I don't want to know where that sentence goes, although I have a guess.

"Would that be changed if she had something less revealing?" I ask him.

"Possibly." Robin mutters.

"Don't I get a say in this?!" Nino sounds confused, determined, and terrified in equal measure.

"Depends; what do you plan to do?" I ask her.

Nino stops.

Did…did she really not think that through?

She slumps. "I don't know."

Chrom smiles at her. "Then, please accompany us; we'll keep you safe until you can make your decision later."

Nino looks at him.

I think I can hear her heart skip a beat.

Hoo boy.

_To be fair, yours did too, and you're a guy._

…Ok, fair point. Chrom is like the dashing-est lord so far.

_Most dashing._

…

…

So, travel arrangements.

Nino's riding with Lon'qu.

…Who decided that?

Lon'qu looks like he's going to be…uh. Well, not-well. The fact that Nino doesn't have anything to change into doesn't help. The village isn't big enough to have its own stores and Chrom wouldn't accept charity from the needy. So she's still wearing that dress with the anime-length skirt.

Lissa looks pouty. Really damn pouty.

I wonder why.

Given that both Nino and Lon'qu both looks supremely uncomfortable…

"Lissa, do you want to switch with Nino?" I ask her.

"Can I?!" Lissa is enthusiastic about the switch, to put it mildly.

Lon'qu is looking at me like I'm trying to assassinate him. Sorry, man, but she's got a thing for you and this ship needs to leave the harbor.

Nino looks…a bit cowed. I guess Lon'qu is a little terrifying.

"Uh, I mean, sure." Lissa backpedals after Chrom looked at her with a raised eyebrow.

Nino (rather gratefully) switches places with Lissa.

_Couldn't Miriel have switched with Nino?_

Yeah, I guess. I don't think she would listen though.

_Or Sumia._

Sumia needs to fly.

…

…

Nino spent the rest of the time on the road with her head on a swivel, taking in everything and muttering excitedly under her breath.

I figured she was excitable, but I didn't think…

_Remember that she grew up with assassins._

Oh…yeah. That. It would be reasonable for her to have learned a few tricks of their trade. Such as watching her surroundings carefully.

…

Still, she's adorable and has magical badassery of epic proportions.

…

While we're on the subject of Nino. What the fuck is she doing here?

No, more importantly. How did she get here?

_Suddenly and abruptly, much like you did._

Well, yeah, sure, but…

_At no point did the brochure of time travelling shenanigans suggest that only characters relating to the Awakening plot would appear due to time travel reasons._

…That doesn't quite explain why it would be Nino and not someone like, say, Ninian.

And more importantly we don't know if it's time travel we're talking about at all.

_Meaning?_

Meaning the plot of Fire Emblem Seven could be happening right now, or relatively close to right now.

_In other words, Nino was just blown across a continent or two._

The Awakening map is too small to be a proper "world"; it would make sense if Elibe was, say, south of the Ylisse coastline.

_Ylisse's not even close to the equator, if you consider how temperate it is…_

Yeah, wow. Every continent in Fire Emblem continuity would fit on the same planet.

_And they would all be Europe._

…

"Hey. Uh…" Nino says.

"Hmm?"

"Where am I?" Nino asks. "I know I'm not in Bern anymore."

"You're in the country of Ylisse, on the continent of Akaneia." Good thing I paid token attention to the backstory.

"Ok…" I didn't answer her question, by the looks of it.

"In other words you're really far away from home with little chance of returning. Do you remember how you got here?"

"No. I went to bed and then I woke up here." Nino sighs. "Maybe mother left some magical trinket out."

…

Shit.

…

Wait. She mentioned Lloyd and Linus before. So this is the Black Fang Nino. Ok. I panicked for no reason there.

"You seem to know…a lot." Nino sounds a bit unsure of that statement.

"I just have very good guesses."

_Stealing lines from old men now, are we?_

…

After some more travelling, we finally hit upon the walls of Ylisstol.

After our horses have been stabled…

"Robin." Fredrick calls to her, and then indicates to Nino with a tilt of his head.

Robin nods. "Hey, girl."

"Nino." Nino responds almost immediately.

"Nino. We need to get you some new clothes."

Nino looks down at her outfit. "What's wrong with what I'm wearing?"

"It's too…revealing." Robin says, and then looks at me.

"Really?" Nino mutters.

"You're showing a lot of leg and that's kind of unusual around here." I say.

"It's pretty normal in Bern though." Nino says, but follows Robin all the same.

"Sorry to trouble you, Robin." Fredrick says with a slight bow.

Robin smiles. "Not a problem; c'mon, let's get you something good."

Yay, shopping time for them.

I follow everyone else indoors to the Castle.

…

And then I become deaf because Chrom has a lot of admirers in the royal ladies.

I can see why Fredrick wanted Nino to dress down some.

_She would've been torn to shreds._

…

"Ash." Chrom says to me, once we've gotten past the small crowd.

"Yeah?"

"I need to make a report to Emm. I want you to come along." Why?

"What's the occasion?"

He takes a breath.

"Of the shepherds, you seem to have the greatest amount of worldly information. I would like your opinion on a few things."

…Does that make me a politician? I feel like it makes me a politician.

"Sure."

…

…

"Sis." Chrom does a ceremonial bow, but since we're alone here it was more for appearances than anything else.

Of note: also attending the meeting is Lissa, Virion, and Fredrick, as well as a map of Ylisse.

"Chrom, it's good to see you safe." Emmeryn smiles.

"I have my friends to thank for that." Chrom smiles back.

And then everyone looks grim.

"So what's the news?"

Virion taps the map on the western-most edge. The border with Plegia. "The Pegasus knights have reported a buildup of troops along the Plegian side of the border. It's fair to say that they will be attacking soon."

Chrom's…doing a little seething. "Then it's fortunate we have the alliance with Ferox; how are our preparations?"

Virion looks uncomfortably at Emmeryn.

"I will speak with the king of Plegia, and find out why they desire a war." Emmeryn says diplomatically.

"Sis…" Chrom starts to object.

…

The huff that just escaped from my lips could be classified as "Wow you are naïve" compressed into a single note.

…

"Is there something you'd like to say, sir Ash?" Emmeryn says with a small smile.

"I'm not one for formalities, your eminence, so I'll just cut to the chase. Do you really need to ask them why they're attacking?"

…

Virion scowls. "Certainly, good sir, you don't mean…"

I look at him.

"…that they are attacking in vengeance, after all those years of inaction?"

"That's exactly what I mean." I nod at him.

"Ash, that's preposterous." Chrom says. "If they wanted vengeance for what my father did, they would've attacked a long time ago."

"Which is true, but we're putting that issue aside for now. Your highness, how do you plan to persuade them?"

_This is your chance to stop her from ever needing to hop off the ledge to begin with._

I'm working on it.

"I shall personally speak with the king of Plegia. It will not be an easy task, but I'm sure we will come to a conclusion that's satisfactory for both of us."

Must…resist…urge…of putting head into wall…

I take a few calming breaths. No head of state is this naïve. I do not believe she is actually this naïve. She did not survive through years of hatred from her own populace just to be this naïve. "And why should he listen to you?"

…

"Oy, oy, Ash. You're insisting that a leader of a country will just ignore another one?" Virion has a small laugh at that.

"No. I'm saying that a country being driven by hatred isn't going to listen to its mortal enemy preach peace."

Silence.

_Germany's hatred made a lot of bad shit happen after world war one._

To be fair it was more because Hitler was fucking insane than anything else.

_True._

"The fact that you're willing to resort to diplomacy first and foremost is commendable, but…there's a time and place, lady, and this is not the time or place."

"Ash. Do you really believe that Plegia will ignore my sister?" Chrom says worriedly.

She has that reputation built up behind her as a beacon of peace, after all.

"It ultimately depends." I say after a long moment. "Not everyone in Plegia is in favor of war, but those people are also not the ones in power, given the circumstances."

"I would like to avoid a war; it serves no purpose." Emmeryn says.

"All of us would like to avoid a war." I shrug. "But right now the choice isn't ours to make. A man dedicated to killing you won't stop just because you don't want to fight back."

"Sounds like you know more than you're willing to share. Again." Fredrick remarks.

I sigh. "In a sense; I heard that the king of Plegia is a little bit insane." And possibly being manipulated by an outside force.

_Technically the Grimleal is an inside force._

"So this king is why they're about to invade?" Chrom says. "The man is mad!"

Mad Gangrel is mad. What are the odds?

Also judging by Fredrick's comment Plegia (or Ylisse, or both) hasn't spied on each other for a while.

"So they say." I laugh. "Either way, with his ass at the helm Plegia's not going to back down from a war; I doubt he'll even need a reason to do it."

What's with the game forcing Gangrel to look for a casus belli anyways? Wars have been fought for lesser reasons than "Because you slaughtered the shit out of my country and I want payback." It's not like Plegia's worried about excommunication and they're already in poor terms with every country on the continent.

"If he does that, Plegia will be the target of the world." Robin says behind me, having finished her shopping, apparently. "She's pretty easy to shop for, as it turns out."

Nino shows up behind her, wearing her outfit but with some cloth pants underneath her skirt…pants that doesn't reach down very far.

But she's now wearing thigh highs along with her boots. Either way, she's not showing as much leg.

"I didn't know where you were." Robin said apologetically to the room.

Nino points at herself and then at the door. "Should I not be here?" is what her body language implies.

I shrug. Nino takes a seat at the table and tries to look as small and insignificant as possible.

Emmeryn doesn't seem mind in the least, given the beaming smile she gave to Nino.

"Ash. Why do you believe Plegia has a desire to fight?" Robin asks me after she had taken a seat.

I stare at her blankly. "Because their next-door neighbor tried to wipe them off the map. Why else?"

"So why not attack sooner?" Virion said with a small smirk. It's quite obvious he doesn't want to believe that a war is unavoidable.

Well, nobody wants to believe that.

"Because they couldn't." I admit to spending a few nights mulling this over.

"What?" Chrom narrows his eyes.

"Think about it. Plegia's not a self-sufficient country to begin with. Most of their territory is either wastelands or deserts. That type of land doesn't make for good farming."

"Most of Plegia's income is based on mineral exports, if I remember right." Robin mutters. "They were pretty wealthy as a result."

"Plegia was an importer of food from Ylisse before the previous king declared war, and the biggest exporter for military equipment." Fredrick says. "Of course, they're not buying anything from us nowadays."

"Yeah. Now imagine, what's the best way to stop a starved country from counterattacking?"'

Silence.

Then the dawning realization occurs.

"No…" Robin puts a hand to her mouth.

Chrom narrows his eyes. "Are you suggesting that my father was correct?"

"No. Hell no." I raise my hands in refusal. "But he did buy you the time to get Ylisse back under control."

"Wait, I'm confused." Lissa raises her hand. "What did you mean?"

"He means…that the best way to stop a counterattack is to burn Plegia to the ground." Virion breathes.

"Which Emmeryn's dad did to the best of his ability. With Plegia in shambles there was no way for any king to muster the support or manpower for a war, thus Ylisse got to enjoy a few years of peace." I stop to look at Chrom, Lissa, and Emmeryn in turn. "While the people of Plegia picked up what remained of their life."

I look at Emmeryn. "You weren't allowed access into Plegia back then, I assume."

Emmeryn shakes her head. "My days were spent for the sake of Ylisse."

"And Ylisse is all the better for it. Unfortunately nobody like you existed in Plegia, and even if they did, Plegian life is hard enough without the devastation caused by war."

I sigh, largely because I just remembered a third point.

"Long story short, it's entirely possible that Plegia is attacking as a mixture of both hatred and desperation."

"Because Plegia isn't importing from us, and Valentia is embroiled in its own war right now." Fredrick says, with a glance towards Virion.

Valentia? Must be Valm before it was Valm.

Virion was a noble from the…Rosanne? Which was on the other continent, if I have my backstory right.

"Between reconstruction, general day to day, and what is most likely an overly devout focus on military presence, I think it's safe to say that Plegia's running out of money, since they have no export market." Not to mention resources being diverted to the Grimleal.

"You don't believe they're close to running out of food?" Virion asks me.

Hmm…mulling it over for a minute.

"I think…if they were close to running low on food, Plegia would break at the seams. They have the logistics to put and support an army near the border, after all."

"So they're attacking only for robbing us? The dogs!" Chrom snarled.

"Chrom." Emmeryn said sharply.

"Blame their nobles, not their people." I say to him. Emmeryn looks at me all surprised. "The common folk would like nothing better than to live their days in peace. It's us nobles that worry about world events and call them into war."

"I see." Chrom takes a deep breath. "I expected that from Emm, not you, Ash." Chrom laughs.

"Do you believe that this hatred can be resolved without bloodshed?" Emmeryn asks me.

"No, I do not." Giving in to Plegia's demands would literally summon a giant fuckoff dragon, so it's not a good idea.

"Then what do you recommend?" Fredrick asks. I think he's just asking to be polite.

I sigh.

"Emmeryn is extremely stubborn so I think she'll just keep trying to talk to them no matter what I say." Emmeryn smiles just a little proudly at that statement.

"You got that right." Lissa mutters.

"So my suggestion is to have plan B ready. The instigator of this second war would be Plegia, so if we cut off their warmonger heads we should be fine." I stretch.

"You sound like my dad." Nino says. Before realizing that she said anything and then going red with embarrassment.

I sound like Brendon Reed?

"With the whole 'death to evil' thing?" I laugh.

Nino nods, face still in her hands. Then she looks up. "Wait, how did you know my father was?"

"You mentioned Lloyd and Linus." I shrug. "I sympathize with their sentiments." A pity that he married a blow-up doll.

"Who is your father?" Emmeryn asks Nino.

"Um, he's the leader of the Black Fangs back in Bern. The best mercenaries in the world!"

Mercenaries. Right.

"Uh…" Lissa looks at me blankly. I shrug in return.

…

"Very well. I will attempt to contact Plegia." Emmeryn says, getting up.

"And we'll get ready for a war just in case." Chrom gets up as well.

…

"Ash." Robin catches me after the meeting was adjourned. Chrom and Emmeryn had left earlier, busy discussing something.

"What's up?"

"Uh…right. Outrealmer." Robin was confused for a second. I need to stop using slang. "Do you really think Plegia has no market? There's a war on the other continent, after all."

Hmm…

Walhart's reason for attack was to organize Valm under one banner, and then crush the shit out of the Grimleal. I don't think that would've changed all that much, even with the disturbance that is me showing up.

"I think…Valm's king right now has an ulterior motive for his war."

Robin rolls her eyes. "And you know what the reason is and don't want to tell me."

I nod. "Sorry."

Robin sighs. "Fine, they're too far away to be a problem right now anyways; so you think that if the other nations on Valentia purchase arms from Plegia, it'll make them a target?"

"Yeah, that's pretty much it. In reality Plegia will still be exporting, but I don't think it's enough to fill their coffers." Or the Grimleal's, depending on how greedy the religious ones are.

Robin nods. "I see. Thanks." And she runs off.

"What was that all about?" Nino asks.

I shrug. "So, what's going to happen to you now?" I ask her.

"I'm going to be living in the castle as a guest of Lady Emmeryn." Nino says, tripping over Emmeryn's name a little.

"That's good." I let of a sigh of relief. "I think I'm going to be busy for the next month, but I'll come visit whenever I can."

"What? Where are you living then?" Nino asks.

"The Shepherd quarters." Nino's not sworn in as a Shepherd; which is a pity, really.

"Oh. Maybe I should join up too."

"For Chrom?" I grin.

"Huh?"

"Nevermind." She's a little too innocent to tease like that, apparently.

…

…

_So, what are we doing for the next month?_

Diving deeper into magic and figuring out how to kill Gangrel from a quarter of a mile away. Hopefully further.

.

.

.

{ === + === }

Yay Nino!

I don't really have anything planned for Nino. I just like Nino because she's adorable.

Also:

_**Casus belli**_ is a Latin expression meaning "An act or event that provokes or is used to justify war".

Copied straight from wikipedia, for those of you not familiar with the term. I try to avoid using terms from languages I don't use, but there wasn't a better one that summed up the situation.


	7. From - Shepherd Barracks (2)

The best part about having daily routines is…

Being able to blink and find out that weeks have passed.

Or something.

_So what did you do for the past few weeks?_

Magic research involving wind and thunder…

_No fire?_

No fire. It doesn't burn, so it's not as important.

Anyways, magic research, training with whoever is generally around the barracks, usually Stahl, riding lessons with the squires that showed up…

_Squires?_

I guess they would still be Cavaliers.

Emmeryn still has her reputation of being extremely anti-war so she can't exactly muster troops, but Ylisse needs a standing army to counter whatever bullshit Plegia might be planning. Robin came up with the brilliant idea of drawing new recruits from the wealthier citizens of Ylisstol to build an all-cavalry unit for the purposes of "responding to the Risen threat that plagues Ylissean countryside" as an alternative force to the Pegasus Knights.

_You pitched in with the idea._

Well, yeah, that too.

_The active mind had suggested that the unit be composed of anyone relatively wealthy enough to provide their own horse, as opposed to just the nobility as Robin had suggested._

What the passive mind said. Anyways, so the new recruits are being put through their paces, with Fredrick and Sully teaching them in turn, and with me tagging along for extra riding lessons and acting as an instructor when they're a little swamped.

It's a little odd to be teaching people older than me, I have to admit. A majority of the citizen cavalry are composed of fairly wealthy 30somethings who were shop owners or traders or the like. The rest is composed of noble teenagers who are in the unit per their parent's wealth and blessings.

I don't think any parent wants to send their child off into battle, but that's the lie we spun.

_And they bought it. Well, most of them._

...

Magic research and lessons have gone over pretty well.

I figured out that wind can also be used as a means of propulsion for the self, provided that I have a place for them to shoot out of. The caveat being that if I give myself too much speed I will splatter against the wall and that will be very bad for my well-being.

_During his trial runs with the wind-as-acceleration spell he ran into a wall and had to be rushed into the infirmary by an observing Maribelle._

That wasn't fun.

Thunder on the other hand…

Is not real electricity. It doesn't arc, it doesn't hit the…what, closest position of negative charge like real lightning. I think, I don't remember the properties of electricity very well.

Point being I can protect against it by letting it explode against something else.

But, and this is the big one: Thunder does provide a repulsive effect with each other, assuming low enough charge.

_At high charge they blow up as if two spells hit each other. Lissa had to heal his arm up from that particular experiment. Several times._

So if I were to, say, have a barrel charged with a few thunder spells, I could conceivably accelerate an object up to insane speeds and make a rail gun before gunpowder is invented.

_He tried that. It kind of worked. The projectile accelerated by the thunder spells didn't fly forward._

_Guess where we ended up. Go on. Guess._

At this point I have a maid constantly following me the instant I leave the confines of the castle. A maid or Lissa, depending on if she's free or not.

Science is hard.

…

…

"Where, pray tell, are you going?"

I stop.

I'm halfway out of the castle.

_You could run for it._

"I'm going into town?" I answer, a little meekly.

Maribelle huffs. "If you'll wait for a moment, I shall arrange for a maid to accompany you."

At this point they expect me to end up in the hospital every day.

_You have ended up in the hospital every day._

"I'm only going to visit a blacksmith. No magic involved, I swear."

Maribelle doesn't believe me. "You've said that every day."

Damn.

…

And now I'm out in the town being followed by a dolled up maid.

This isn't doing wonders for my ability to blend in.

_You've already gained a reputation for being a little insane, given the palace's recent tendencies to suddenly explode in bright colors. The people know who you are. In fact they're already trying to stay the fuck away from the man being followed by a maid._

Wonderful.

…

"Hello!" I say once I step into the blacksmith I'm looking for.

"Ah! Sir Ash. Good timing, your order is finished." The blacksmith says. "I must admit I've never made tools like these before, especially not in this size."

The tools he's referring to is a set of four steel rods, as well as a hollow, iron cylindrical base with four holes drilled into it.

As it turns out, trying to build a rail gun with only two rods caused the projectile to fly in unreasonable directions. But that was probably because I was firing nails.

_You got some strange looks when you showed up in your firing range with a large crate of nails._

I'm pretty sure Lissa made a little money by betting that I would end up injured again back then.

Nobody's willing to bet that now, but I'm getting sidetracked.

"I could imagine; your work is as good as your reputation." I say, examining the rods. They were smooth, and had enough space for me to fill it up with something powdery. I'm a little worried that they're not going to last.

But then that's why they're made to be replaceable.

"What do you plan to do with something like this?" The smith asked.

"That's my little secret. And yours, if you would be so kind."

The smith shrugs. "As long as I get paid."

I toss him his asking rate, plus a little extra. "That'll be adequate, thanks."

He gestures to the box of rods. "Pleasure doing business with you, sir."

I pick up the box and carry it away. Oh. Damn.

"And not a word from you either." I tell (a little too rudely) to the maid.

She curtsies and I feel bad.

"If only because you'll be in danger once this blows up." I mutter.

…

…

"Oh, Ash, you're oh gods you have another box_._" Lissa says when she sees me carrying the box of rail gun parts to the courtyard. The terror in her voice is immense.

"Yep." I on the other hand sound totally happy about all of this.

She sighs. "I'll get the hospital bed ready." And totters off.

Totters?

_Ylisse has no drinking age._

Uh, anyways…

_In case you didn't register, the maid that accompanied you was swarmed by other maids who offered her their condolences. You are not a reputable person._

Science never is.

…

"What manner of self-injury are you planning to cause today?" Miriel asked lazily from her perch on the…second story balcony. She likes high places to read from, apparently.

"If everything goes well, no injury to my own person." I say quite proudly.

…

Ok, so…first, each rail will have to be filled with spirit water.

_Spirit water._

Spirit dust mixed with water. Spirit dust is weird, it's doesn't mix with water but it causes the water to glow blue, and when the water evaporates—which happens disturbingly fast when spirit dust is involved—the dust isn't dry at all.

The dust is also heavy as hell. One bottle half the size of a 12 ounce soda can is like twenty pounds.

This stuff makes no fucking sense.

…

Welp. Fuck.

_Yeah._

…

"Did something happen?" Miriel asks when she noticed that I had stopped moving.

"Just…realized that I had forgotten a factor." I sigh.

This gun is going to be pretty heavy.

Good thing I've been doing nothing but physical labor (kind of, sort of) for the entire time that I've been here.

…

Anyways, fill the four rods with spirit water…

…

Wait for it to dry…

…

…

Now place in the casting paper...

I found out that a single sheet of paper with a spell circle can cast spells when mixed with spirit dust. It still needs to be activated by the caster, but this way I could…

I could make mines from this. Nifty. I'll save that for later.

…

Screw them in…c'mon fit goddammit

FIT I SAY

THE GOD OF FURNITURE COMPELS YOU

_God of Furniture...Ikea?_

There we go. Whew.

…

Load in the nails…or, rather, a nail.

…

Test the weight…

Nope. Way too heavy for me to aim with one arm. It's about four feet long, from rail to base, and the weight distribution means I need to double hand it if I want to aim it.

Wonderful.

"That is the most incomprehensible tool I've ever seen." Miriel said with a note of laughter in her voice.

"Yeah, well…if it works, I can care less how it looks. Function over form and all that." I say, putting it down and setting up a targeting dummy against the outer wall.

This thing will definitely not have the penetration power of the stereotypical sci-fi rail gun. But it's definitely going to hit harder than a bow.

Ok. Grab weapon handle…I can't hold the rail portion of the gun. This was poorly designed.

_You designed it._

So let's…rest my trigger hand on my other elbow, like the XCOM snipers.

Focus…

Activate the rods…

_The four rods are now glowing faintly and crackling with electricity, psuedo-electricity, whatever._

Feed a nail into the chamber (the hollow iron base that uses more spell power to hover the nail away from the walls)

And…pull trigger!

_FVOOM_

…

O…kay. Wow. Uh…I'm now a…

Wow.

I uh…

I may be doing something dramatically evil here.

Like, immensely, irrevocably evil. Holy shit.

Is this what the inventor of the machine gun felt?

Uh…

…

"Is…is that...?" Miriel breathed, looking at the wooden post the test dummy was tied to.

Or rather, the stump of it. The dummy itself is pinned to the wall by a nail, and judging by the amount of straw that fell out of the dummy's back, its backside is entirely broken.

If…if that's what's going to happen to a human, I'm…uh…I may want to drop the power some just so I'm not committing a war crime with every shot.

Yeah…yeah. I think I'll do that. I can't control the power of the rods without physically removing the spell paper and replacing another one, so…yeah. I really should do that.

"It's…a lot more effective than I had anticipated." I finally say, still staring at the dummy.

…

I should take a moment and reconsider this decision.

…

…

…

_What is there to reconsider? We want a game-changing advantage against Plegia, Valm, Grima, everything evil, and here it is in the form of the prototype rail gun._

Well, yeah, but odds are 99 percent of its victims is going to be the hapless soldier drafted to fight for Plegia.

_Coupled with hatred for Ylisse, don't forget that._

I haven't; their hatred is just another form of Patriotism. Their love for their country, their hatred for the injustice brought upon their heads just because of a difference in religion, all of it is still patriotism, even if they're on the opposite side.

_Their religion revolves around an evil fuckoff dragon._

The Grimleal revolves around an evil fuckoff dragon.

Either way, I'm dropping the power output.

_Having the ability to end a battle faster than it started is an invaluable asset._

We might end a battle but we're going to lengthen the war.

_Look, just put in two spell papers with half power, that way you'll have a trump card for the morale damage. If you can kill the enemy leader with such finality that the enemy will fear you, then naturally they'll be less likely to fight._

Not quite sure about them being less likely to fight, but fine.

…

…

I hear the door to my room-slash-workshop creak.

"Ash, what is that thing?" I hear Lissa ask as I tune my new rail gun. I need a name for it.

_Sasha?_

It doesn't have enough dakka to be worthy of that name.

"This? This is my weapon." I say, patting the gun base.

_You also said that with the barest hint of the Heavy voice._

I'm trying to push the serious amounts of death that I will be dealing out of my head.

_You're in a pseudo medieval age. People fight by hacking each other to pieces. You're going to be pretty damn civilized, all things considered._

There's no skill in pulling a trigger.

_There is skill in building the damned gun from scratch. You wanted to walk down this road. Own up to it._

"Are you ok? You look a bit pale." Lissa asked, staring at me.

"Yeah, I'm…fine. Just fine." I say.

I don't think she believes me.

Hell, **I **don't believe me.

"Are you worried about something?" Lissa asks, sitting down on my bed.

I sigh. "I'm worried that I'm walking down a path I can't come back from." I stare at the gun.

A future where Ylisse become the aggressors due to their superior military technology.

_You give yourself way too much credit._

"Huh? What's that supposed to mean?" Lissa grumbles.

"It…nevermind." Especially worrying is if this gets reverse engineered.

_How? It took you needing prior knowledge and extensive field testing according to a form of methodology that the world hasn't even seen yet; the closest person who can possibly reverse engineer this is Miriel, and she's on your side._

"Well, if you're the one behind it, then it should be ok, right?"

…What?

I look at Lissa, and she smiles at me.

"Chrom says he trust your judgment, even if he doesn't agree with it." She giggles. "And I trust you, too. I know you'll never do anything to hurt us."

Lissa…

I am going to end up proving you so wrong in the future, I can just feel it.

For now though, I smile. She is really good at cheering people up.

_Responsibility is tempered, not granted. We have the power…_

So we must train to use it responsibly. Yeah.

…

…

[The next day]

…

…

I find Sumia rushing about with her armor, collecting Pegasus Knights.

With her flashy, in-game sprite armor, instead of the leather armor she had before.

"Sumia, what's the rush?" I ask her after she had stopped to catch her breath.

"Bandit attack. One of the major towns is being sieged by bandits; Chrom wants us to go help."

As if on cue, Chrom walks out from one of the side rooms.

"Ash, I assume Sumia told you the situation?" Chrom fiddles with the Falchion slung at his waist.

"Bandits hitting town, need rapid response. How far away are they?"

"About two days from here." Robin said, looking at a notebook. "At flying speed."

"How are bandits sieging though? No, why are bandits sieging?" Maribelle asked; she volunteered as a healer for the group, her reasoning being that healing on Pegasusback isn't much different from on horseback.

I think she's speaking from experience, which scares me a little.

"We don't know either. The village sent a messenger a before they were enclosed. Regardless, the shepherds are riding to their aid." Chrom declared.

I nod. "I'm going too." Per Fredrick's suggestion the rail gun is constantly slung on my back so I can get used to its weight during the inevitable military marches.

I've also entertained the concept of calling it the Balmung, for its eventual duty as an anti-dragon weapon.

"Are you sure?" Chrom frowns. I've spent almost every afternoon in the hospital so far, except the past two days.

"Yeah, I'm good to go." I say. "Well, almost. I need ammo. Be right back."

…

I rush back to my room to stock up on nails.

_Industrial grade tools for an industrial grade war._

No kidding.

…

Soon enough, the Pegasus riders were ready and we were off!

Of the eight Pegasus riders in this expedition, Sumia's the only one I recognize.

And apart from me, Robin, and Chrom, the rest of the Shepherds in attendance are: Vaike, Miriel, Virion, Ricken, and Kellam.

…

Wait, Kellam?

KELLAM?!

He doesn't have the oversized armor. He's dressed like a light soldier.

Oh my god what if I've ignored Kellam since I've gotten here holy shit

…

Ok, freakout done.

No, not quite.

…

Ok, done for real this time.

…

First day ends, we camp.

Chrom worries that the town can't hold out long enough.

Robin worries that we would be too tired if we rush at full speed toward the town.

I worry because I don't see Kellam anymore.

Like, he has physically phased out of existence.

"Ricken, do you see Kellam anywhere?" I ask him because I am genuinely terrified.

"Huh? He came with us?" Ricken…is of no help.

…then again I'm not sure why Kellam is terrifying.

"Wait, did Kellam really come with us?" Ricken started asking the general public.

Kellam then speaks up. "I did, Ricken; did you need something?" He's standing right behind Ricken, right next to me.

Ricken seems to have swallowed the scream he had cued up. "Not really. Ash was asking for you though."

"Yeah, hi. Were you with us all this time?" I ask him.

"Well, yes." He scratches his head. "I was surprised you didn't notice me, actually, what with all that magic you used. I volunteered to look after you but nobody heard me, too."

So I've been stalked by a man for the past three weeks and didn't notice.

_Correction, you've been watched by Kellam for the past three weeks._

I'm gonna…go scream at something now. Be right back.

…

…

…

So, as it turns out, Kellam is visible as long as you have him in your field of vision. Once he's gone you have to spend minutes to reacquire him.

If I end up shooting him in the back I swear to god it will not be my fault.

_You told him to not stand in front of you last night. It'll be fine._

…

We arrive near the town and oh shit I forgot to make a scope for the gun.

God dammit.

Oh well.

We arrive at the town edge and…there's a disturbing lack of smoke and fire and signs of pillaging.

_Don't see a sentence like that every day._

"Robin." I'm worried that this is a trap.

"Yeah." Robin's eyes are focused.

"Even if it is a trap, we must ride to the aid of any citizens of Ylisse." Chrom said. So he came to the same conclusion.

Chrom is an attacker but he isn't stupid. Ok.

_Or maybe he's insane, since he just told us to charge into a trap._

I really wish I made a sight for this thing.

Good thing I brought a spell book and some knives as backup.

…

"Ash, what would you be now?" Robin asks me as we advance closer to the town.

What would I be? She waves to the large thing on my back. Ah.

"A mage-like unit, I suppose." I say after a moment. "I can melee but I would rather like to stay at range."

"Got it." Robin nods, her brain probably going a mile an hour. "I wish we brought more melee power then." She sighs and then turns around to face the town.

I point to the dismounted Pegasus knights, every last one of them quite cute and not dangerous looking, factoring out their spears. "And they don't count?"

"Not really." Robin says without turning around.

"Why aren't they mounted anyways?" I ask her.

"Siege warfare. Lots of missiles. Bad for flying." Robin says quickly.

"Ok."

…

Yeah, the insane lack of combat in the town is definitely suspicious…

Focus spell power, prepare wind shield.

I got Miriel to teach it to me and then modified it to spin more for more projectile blockage.

…

"Incoming!" Robin yells a split second before the sky suddenly darkens.

Holy shit they want us killed.

Release spell power!

Miriel came to same conclusion, and the two of us blew enough arrows to FUCK ow that hurt

Cover most of everyone.

"This is definitely a trap. We need to do some more scouting." I say to Robin.

Ignore the damned arrow in my shoulder. Ugh this shit hurts.

"Sir! Behind us!" One of the Pegasus knights yell while a second barrage fly at us from the walls.

Fuck it. Gun time. Bring out rifle, hope that Miriel can cover all of us alone…

_She isn't alone; Ricken is picking up your share._

Behind us is Cavaliers. Four of them. My magazine size is three rounds. Fine by me.

"Back, back!" Chrom shouts, and we scramble away from the town while the cavaliers bear down on us.

_Credit to the enemy archers: they waited until we were close enough for several volleys before opening fire._

…

Ok, they should be close enough. Ignore the searing pain in my shoulder…

I should be able to hit them from here.

Aim!

"Ash! What are you doing?!" Chrom demands, watching me suddenly plant my feet down and look down the barrel of this freakish thing.

No time to reply.

Focus spell power…

And…

Fire!

_FVOOM_

…

First shot, miss!

The nail moves around too much in the chamber. Fuck.

The force of the nail flying by slowed the horse down a little though. So I guess that's good. Probably.

The pain is not making it any better.

_Here's some adrenaline and endorphins to make it better._

…

Second shot.

"ASH!" Robin is half desperate and angry, especially since I'm disobeying orders.

It's not like we can run away anyway.

Ricken is being a total boss by shielding me with his wind spells, since I'm still barely in range of the archers on the walls.

Ok…

Focus…

And…

Fire!

_FVOOM~ I'm gonna do this every time you shoot because your gun makes like no noise~_

Yeah! Clean hit.

The man was knocked flying from his horse. Literally flying from his horse.

Even at half power this shit is…oh I wasn't actually at half power was I. GOD DAMMIT

Nothing's going right.

…

Because one of their members suddenly flew off their horse, the other three slowed their charging long enough for Virion to pick them off with his insanely good aim.

For the record, I killed my guy instantly while Virion's targets fell off the horse, but are probably alive.

Either way the charge threat is gone.

"Let's go." I tap Ricken on the shoulder. He nods.

And we run the fuck away because FUCK arrow rain.

_There was like a thousand arrows near Ricken's feet. The little guy's pretty good with wind._

…

"Well, that was different." Vaike says dryly while being healed by Maribelle.

"Yeah. I knew it was too odd to be anything but a trap." Robin seethed.

Two knights are dead and the rest of us all had arrow wounds. Miriel in particular came uncomfortably close to being killed due to the sheer volume of arrows she had to fend off.

"What's done is done." Chrom sighed; the man doesn't like seeing his people die. Then again, none of us do. "What should we do next, Robin?"

"We're taking that town." She says almost instantly. "They're obviously not on our side, and letting them roam free is going to cause nothing but trouble for the rest of Ylisse."

That's…a little bit of a stretch, Robin, but I agree in concept.

"Ash. How far does that weapon of yours reach?" She asked me.

"Longer than my vision." I say, tapping my glasses.

_Active mind forgot to mention: He got a pair of glasses that gave him pretty good vision during the three week time skip._

"And it operates by magic so Virion can't use it." She mutters, scribbling furiously in her notebook again.

"Should we call for reinforcements?" Kellam asked. He seemed to be…actually, not fine at all. He was probably covering for the lady knights despite the fact that we can't see him.

"They won't make it in time." Chrom said, staring at the town in the distance.

…

But…

If they're bandits, then why do they have so much fire power? If one man can shoot an arrow in a volley then they should have a hundred archers, easy.

I doubt all of them would be archers, so there would be melee troops inside the town, too.

"Are there any bandit groups large enough in Ylisse to qualify as an army?" I ask out loud.

"Not that I…know…of…" Robin says, trailing off.

_Whirrr click._

Fucking. Plegia.

"Plegia is trying to start a war." Robin breathed. "With us as the aggressors. Those…" She finished her sentence with an incomprehensible and stifled scream of rage.

"And they're going to sacrifice a few hundred of their own men to do it." Virion sounds amazingly angry.

Also, good to know that we're on the same page.

"We need to stop them right here, right now." Robin declares, probably drawing battle plans in her head.

"And we need to do it before night falls." I say, looking up at the sky. That gives us…maybe two hours until sunset, probably more than that. Hopefully more than that.

Robin nods. "Once night falls they will ride out and attack us, or we'll lose them in the night entirely. Let me think." She then wanders a little ways off with her notebook, muttering to herself.

In the meantime…

Maribelle plucks the arrow HOLYFUCKTHATHURTS shoulders. She plucks the arrow from my shoulder. And then heals the wound with her staff.

It's still a little sore, but at least it's ok now.

Reload the gun. And I need to remember to recalibrate it more and then give it a scope.

Which means I need to find a glassmaker. Wonderful.

Oh well. Focus on the task at hand.

…

Robin came back in a short hurry.

"Ash, how's your aiming on horseback?" She asked me worriedly.

I can barely aim with my feet planted. And I tell her as such.

She nods. "Ok, that's better than I expected."

…Really? She had so little faith?

"Ok, here's the plan."

…

…

…

Robin is insane and a genius.

Ricken and Miriel have taken to the air with their wind spells.

Once they've reached a decent height (based on Robin's judgment)…

She took a deep breath, and fired a puff of…well, fire. Into the air.

The Pegasi dove towards the town, and once they've reached what they think is arrow range, the Pegasi pulled back to hover in place, flapping their wings furiously toward the walls.

The wind their wings create then gets a boost from the two spellcasters, and the end result is…a lot of arrows flying in every direction but the right one.

A second puff of fire.

Virion and I are flown in.

I have my rail gun, and Virion has his bow and like five quivers of arrows.

Aided by the wind, Virion just fires arrows at an ungodly rate into the wall's guards: people dressed like Ylissean militia. The arrows fly fast and not very accurately, but the end result is the same; the wall guards are diving for cover.

Good to know that they're not the…

Wait. They might not even be Plegians at all, given by how poor their morale is.

"Sir! That one!" The knight I ride with yell and point to a man who seems to be giving orders.

Ok.

Gun comes out. Focus spell power…

Tighten my legs because I don't want to fall off…

"Dive!" I order. And she dives at him.

Robin determined that this was the only way I could hit a target.

If the Pegasus was flying smoothly at the ground in a worryingly fast fashion.

I will be spiking her food later for this.

For now…

Focus…Aim…and….

_FVOOM_

WHOA GEEZ I almost fell off. Even with the tiny recoil.

We whiz by the man, and I see…

The man's head and body disconnected by the force of the nail that drove the body into the ground.

I really need to reduce the power, later.

Or increase it. I'm not sure anymore.

Oh well. Debate later, action now. Chamber round two.

The knight goes back into a holding pattern, circling above the town while being protected by Miriel and Ricken.

This is Robin's plan: In the event that the soldiers were not actually Plegian (which was a qualifier she probably considered but didn't voice) we were to nullify their ability to fight and take out all of their military heads. The rest MAY drop their weapons as a result.

Either way, the soldiers who saw their captain get dismembered by an unknown power are certainly cowed enough to run away and not shoot.

Which is good for Ricken and Miriel, since they seem to be tiring from the strain of keeping up their spell constantly.

We need to hurry.

"Where's the second one?" I ask my knight.

_Your knight._

Note to self: Ask the brave lady her name after this battle is over. She has some (proverbial) huge brass balls for diving into a hornets nest just so I can get a clear shot.

"There." She points to the second guy, who seemed to be trying to whip the runners back into formation.

"Go."

…

_FVOOM_

I only got him on the shoulder. But I got the whole "let's not use both spell sheets" thing working.

Which meant the resulting force of the hit spun his body like an ice skater on caffeine mixed with steroids before he lost his balance and was spun into a wall and shattered his head into said wall.

I think if I hooked him up to an electrical generator he would power a town for a day.

No mercy there. Load third round.

…

What's that feeling…?

_Horror movie?_

Yeah.

"Dive! Now!"

The knight didn't question my order and dove a little.

A wave of purple…flame…thing flew over our head.

That must be Flux, or something similar.

Look around. Who…

The asshole wearing the large ominous robe at the town square. Of course.

Oh he's actually still shooting at us.

"Drop me into the town!" I order.

_What are you doing?_

Being stupid.

The lady seems to agree, but given that the man's focused on us and not Ricken and Miriel yet we don't have much of an option. Need to kill him before he kills all eight of us.

She agrees that I'm insane and stupid, not to my plan.

But we're being shot at, so she can either go back and leave the other four in danger, or…watch Chrom and Vaike (and Kellam) charge in to their death.

We dove.

And landed among the rooftops…

Shit.

I pull her roughly off her Pegasus.

And her Pegasus is hit square in the chest with a flux.

Despite it having the appearance of fire flux doesn't burn; the Pegasus is just twitching in pain before it falls over dead.

Fine. I can see your shitty mage robes. Focus…

_FVOOM_

…

I missed. I knew it. I don't know if I can avoid getting hit by a spell if I stay still to reload and snipe…

Ok, plan B. I drop the gun and pull out a dagger.

Even though I missed his ass he's still staggering from the force. Charge!

_It's a good thing these roofs are solid or this would backfire really fast, really quickly._

Distance…closer…closer…

A Street. Fine. Jump down, roll. Get back on my feet.

_Just like practice._

Continue running. He's got his footing back.

Start zigzagging.

He raises his hand, probably to spell me to little pieces…

And a spear flies at him, forcing him to dodge.

Must've been the lady knight. Naga bless her soul for putting up with me.

Also her throwing arm is insane. I don't think this distance counts as two squares.

He got his footing back obscenely quickly though.

Fine.

Focus spell power.

Fly! My dagger of…stabbiness!

Judging by how his body moved that was definitely a hit.

Charge forward faster!

Nevermind how tired I am, nevermind anything. The man is dying.

I have my second (and last) dagger.

Time to channel a little Assassin's Creed.

…

The first knife didn't go deep enough, man's still standing. Shit.

_He's casting._

If I dodge now I lose momentum. Fuck it.

RUN FASTER!

_Oh god we're gonna die._

His hand goes up…that is black fire…

Flying at my face. Ok.

GUH

It's worse than Miriel described.

Flux literally hits as many of your nerves as it can and convinces them that you are in fact burning to death while being cut to little pieces.

_Focus!_

I have but one desire in life.

"And that is to see this knife buried in your face!"

_You yelled that out?_

I'M SORRY I CAN'T HEAR ANYTHING OVER THE SOUND OF MY NERVES SCREAMING

_Target: really damn close. He's also a little cowed at how a man cloaked in black flames is running at full speed towards him while yelling obscenities at the top of his lungs. Well, "an" obscenity._

SERVES HIS ASS RIGHT

JUMP

PIN his ass down.

Me plus my armor plus my knee in your chest means you're not going anywhere, asshat.

"Ha! What can an Outrealmer do to the likes of the Grimleal?!" The man snarls.

…Isn't that like the most common psyche out tactic used in every story ever? But then again…

It's not like my status as an Outrealmer is exactly classified information.

"Guess how many fucks I give." I snarl back, and bring my dagger down.

…

…

Whoa, what the hell was that?

…

…

The wind spells seemed to have stopped…

What's going on? Something black and evil looking just flew from the dead guy.

I'm gonna leave my dagger in his throat just in case.

Er…I think I'm gonna wiggle the dagger some. Just in case.

_Paranoid much?_

…

So what happened?

Before that, what happened to the lady knight?

And I need to re-find my gun.

…

"Hey! You ok over there?" I ask her.

I sound a little…ok, a lot shaky. That flux must've hit a lot harder than I thought, now that my adrenaline isn't coping with it.

"I'm alright, sir." The lady knight said, still from her rooftop.

Ok, so…how do I get up there?

"Hold on, I'm coming down." She said with a grunt. "This thing is oddly heavy."

"It's filled with spirit dust, yeah." I take some deep breaths to try and sound un-shaky. Doesn't work out all that well. "You can just toss it down here; I'll do mainte-whoa!"

She jumps down and lands like a…what would she be? A cat? She lands with a soft grunt, but she seems to be fine.

"Here." She unslings the rail gun and hands it over, which I take…and nearly drop on the ground.

I…am actually shaking a lot. Apparently flux hits deep.

"Are you…" She asks, before coming to the conclusion that I am definitely not ok.

Especially since I seem to be having trouble standing.

Ok…gonna be passing out now.

…

…

…

I hear…voices.

Uh…focus? Focus.

Try to focus.

"Chrom! Chrom! He's awake!" I hear someone yell. Apparently something in my brain broke since I don't know what kind of voice that was.

"How long was I out?" I ask. I sound raspy.

"Four days." I hear the same person respond. (Probably the same person)

The last time I ever passed out it was for like, five seconds.

"Seriously? What happened while I was out?" I sound like I need water.

"Get Maribelle." Thank you mystery person. My eyes also don't seem to be working. "The knight you were with brought you to the front gate in a hurry after you had passed out; she said you had dark magic damage. Maribelle stabilized you and you've been resting ever since."

…All of my five senses don't seem to be working.

_And yet you can hear._

…Yeah, that was poorly phrased. Four point five of my senses aren't working.

"What happened after the battle?"

"Well, uh…after the enemy mage was destroyed, all the soldiers died."

…

What?

"Any ideas on how it happened?"

I can't tell what the tone of the voice is but she (let's face it, it probably is a she) is probably angry.

"It was some odd variant of a dark magic spell. The spell seems to be designed specifically with the purpose of killing people for no strategic gain." I hear a sign. "I've never _seen _magic like this."

So that weird dark thing escaping was the dark magic?

_Would it qualify as a bomb of some kind?_

Hmm…

"Ah! Maribelle. He's up, can you…?"

"Just a second." I hear a voice belonging to probably Maribelle.

And then…nothing.

And then…

Something.

I can feel again.

I feel…warm.

And a little squeezed.

And…uh, slightly red in the face.

Hearing is returning to normal…

I can hear Maribelle softly chanting very, very close to my ear.

…

Touch returning to normal…

I can feel something really really soft really really close.

I feel really really awkward.

Also lucky.

But mostly awkward.

…

Smell returning to normal…

Maribelle wears perfume, but thankfully not overwhelmingly so.

…

Vision returning to normal…

…

Yeah, she's giving me a hug.

I'm confused as to why but I sure as hell am not complaining.

…

I'm going to assume taste is also back to normal, since my mouth tastes dry as all hell right now.

"There, that should do it." Maribelle sighs. "I say, you're nothing but trouble, you know that?" She says, while letting me lay back down.

"Sorry. What was that all about?" I can't help but ask.

She stares straight into my eyes, as if daring me to think about anything suggestive. "For some reason restore staves didn't work on you at all. So we had to resort to the oldest cleric trick in the book."

"Physical touching?"

She nods. "Direct transfer of magic." She taps the staff she's holding and…pops the head off. She then swaps on a different head from a pouch at her waist.

Is that how staves work? Exchangeable heads? I remember Fredrick covering this at some point.

"It seems to have worked. How do you feel?" Robin asked, walking back into the room with a small smile on her lips.

Maribelle huffs. "He should be perfectly fine in a few moments, the fool." And then she struts out of the room.

Robin grins. "Oh I can't wait to spin this one."

I shake my head. "She would undo all that healing, so please don't."

Robin fakes disappointment. "Aww. Oh well, how are you feeling?"

"A lot better." Streeetch. Wow, I feel really damn stiff. "So…what do you think happened to the town?"

Robin scowls. "Best guess? Whoever that mage was showed up and turned the entire town into some kind of demented trap, probably to force a horrid decision from Emmeryn."

Hmm…

"She does nothing and Ylisse is the 'attacker', or she does something and kills off a town to kill one mage." Ugh. "We seemed to have done the latter."

"Yeah, but we have a corpse to show for it." Robin smirked. "All thanks to what is likely your idiocy."

I sigh. "Don't remind me." I get up, and sit back down again because whoa dizzy room is spinning.

"Sit tight, I'll get you something to eat."

"Where am I, anyways?"

"The town hall." In the town we decimated, got it. Robin disappears out of the room and I lie back down.

…

What does this mean?

_This means Plegia has someone who's also stirring things up._

Not necessarily. Reality isn't dictated by memory limitations, so it could've just been Plegia advancing along the path of technology.

_And Ylisse won't?_

Not…government sponsored research. Not war time use technology anyways. She's too…patient, for that.

So there's a very realistic chance of Ylisse being outpaced on the home front before the war begins…

Shit, it's also close to the end of the month.

…

Robin came back with some bread and soup.

I'm hungry as hell so it is delicious.

_Slow down or you will gag._

I gag on air, c'mon.

…

"Wow, you have a lot of control for a hungry person." Robin said, surprised. "I was expecting more wolfing down."

"Oh believe me, I want to." I say between bites.

…

"How's Plegia on the war front?" I think I can stand properly now; I feel the strength born of wheat and…vegetables!

"They haven't made a move, but considering what we've seen they might not have to." Robin scowls. "They might have other ploys hidden in Ylisse, after all."

"Yeah. Hmm…" I…hobble, out of the room. Muscles not really atrophying but fairly non-responsive, but we're good.

"What?" She asks, following me outside.

Lordy it's bright.

…

It seems like the rapid response corps was deployed here…and their first order of business is to dig a lot of graves.

Not pleasant, but I guess it would give them a good shock on exactly what they're signing up for.

So where's the asshole mage?

Ah ha.

"Can we confiscate his robes as evidence?" I ask, tapping the corpse with my foot.

"Evidence?" Miriel asks.

"As proof that Plegia was trying to do something bad." Not that it would matter, since of the three countries in the continent Plegia is the only country that cares about Plegia's reputation.

_And yet they tried a terrorist attack._

Yeah, so I guess not even Plegia cares about Plegia's reputation.

"I can't imagine them caring one way or another." Maribelle remarked, overseeing the burial preparations.

"Yeah, well, I had high hopes." I sigh.

…

Maribelle sudden shrieks in surprise, and we turn to see…

…all the corpses vaporizing.

In the similar purple puff that the Risen dies in.

…The implications behind this are disturbing, but at least they left their worldly belongings behind.

_Is that a good thing?_

"What…" Robin was the first person to find her voice.

The cavaliers were too stunned to be annoyed at having done unnecessary work.

…

I get to have my spent ammo back.

…

Or not, since it crumbled in my hand.

Is this why they have so much power? Because they nearly shatter on impact?

Yikes.

_You seem to be trying to ignore something._

Plegia…Plegia could be killing people to resurrect them as Risen. I…I don't know how or why they want to do that.

"We…we should get back to the castle." I say, before taking a breath and repeating myself with a lot more conviction.

Chrom seems to shake himself out of whatever his thoughts were. "Yes, you're right. Plegia could be planning something else here. Let's hurry."

…

…

"Ash! You're…what's wrong?" Nino asks me the instant I set foot into the castle.

The fact that she just appeared out of nowhere and was accepted as a guest in the castle got her some bad attention, but Nino is just unabashedly nice, so she's well liked enough to be accepted in a few social circles.

I wave absentmindedly at her and shake my head. The previous two nights had more Risen appearance than normal and it put all of us on edge.

I also bought a telescope meant for sailors that'll act as a sight until I get something better.

…

Let's just…do some more training.

And calibrating with this new scope.

…

…

…

"Yo." I look and see Vaike tap me on the shoulder.

It's been another week, and Plegia has been oddly silent.

This only affirms Robin's suspicions that Plegia has something planned, but she can't act on it since it would be rooting out each and every settlement for Grimleal members.

The previous king started his crusade against the Grimleal in much the same way: a religious purge in Ylisstol.

"Hey Vaike." Goes without saying the week of odd silence has put all of us on edge.

"I heard on the grapevine you might get an office in the castle soon." He grinned. "Hope you like paperwork!"

I smile slightly, because I heard the same rumors.

The sitting nobility are hell bent on not letting that happen: class warfare and all that.

In the meantime, I put in an order for a scope with a telescope manufacturer in the city (hellishly expensive, it was) and I got a belt to hold my ammo boxes. So now I can carry more nails, but I can still only load three of them.

I also made a wind-based nail launcher that attaches to my left wrist, so I now have short ranged death without needing to worry about throwing knives.

They work better than my rail gun despite the lack of firepower.

…

As long as I keep busy I can stop driving myself into a mental corner with thinking of all the possible bad things that could happen due to Plegia's odd inaction.

"Oy, you listenin'?" Vaike demands. I've ignored him the entire time he was talking.

"Sorry. Got a lot on my mind." I shake my head. I know that thinking too hard won't help, but still.

"You too? Sheesh, all of you walk around like the sky's gonna fall on your head." He shakes his head. "What's the use worrying about something that hasn't happened yet?"

We worry because it hasn't happened yet, Vaike.

"Y'know what, let's get you set up on a date."

…wait.

"What?" That came out of nowhere.

Vaike grins. "Maribelle wants to visit her family but Lissa of all people don't want her walking around without a guard. Guess who Robin suggested?"

…

Robin, I swear to god I will murder you in your sleep.

…

…

"So Robin's suggestion was taken after all." Maribelle sighs when she sees me walking towards her.

I came to the realization that her abduction might come very soon, so I figured…what better way to stop the abduction than by being there and killing every asshole that shows up?

Given that everything works out like I expect, which is, uh, pretty naïve of me to think so, actually.

"You're oddly well-armed for a family visit." Maribelle says, after noting the fact that I'm carrying my rail gun, a sword, two knives, and two spare packs of nails.

I have enough ammo to kill like a hundred people before needing to move close range.

Also to set up like ten tents.

…

Also she said something about a family visit.

…

Suddenly the Plegians don't seem to be so terrifying after all.

"What are you waiting for? Let us be off." Maribelle huffs.

I…uh…

ROBIN.

I SEE YOU GIGGLING OVER THERE

WHAT DID I EVER DO TO YOU?!

_You spiked her food._

Well, ok, fine, but WHAT DID I EVER DO TO YOU?!

_Sigh._

…

"I don't see why I need a guard for this." Maribelle grumbled.

"Lissa cares about you?" I venture.

"That much is obvious, but I don't see why they would've sent **you** along." She says, throwing me an uncharacteristically dirty look.

"Maybe Ricken would've been a better choice?" I say lightly.

She turns a little. "Why him?"

Oh right. She doesn't feel for him until after the rescue.

"He's another noble, right?"

"A discredited one. He's a nice enough boy, but…" She trails off. She then launches into a speech about the proper behavior of a noble and the expectations of the aristocracy.

_I take it you listened to none of it._

Not a single word.

…

Eventually Maribelle figured out that I wasn't listening and wouldn't speak to me for the rest of the day.

…

[Night]

…

I think it says a lot about the state of the world when the glowing eyes of doom show up and we don't even bat an eyelash.

Also, she gets the tent and I get to sleep outside.

Given how ridiculously pleasant Ylisse is at night I'm not complaining.

As long as the Risen don't show up.

I wish we stopped at an inn instead, but the nearest one burned down.

The undead are all arsonists.

…

[A week later]

Her family's mansion is…sizeable but not overly amazing.

_Like her?_

That would be rudest thing to say out loud. Also it makes no sense.

"We're here." She says with a tired sigh. "If only you weren't here, I could've gotten home faster."

…

No servants?

_Aren't we a bit spoiled by having maids around every corner?_

Well, I guess, but she would've sent word along that she was coming home, right?

"Was this a surprise trip?" I ask her as I lead both horses to the stable.

"No. Why do you ask?" She sounds surprised at my question.

"Just wondering." I shrug, and she shakes her head.

"Regardless." She knocks on the door.

…I'm getting some really weird vibes here.

_It's just your paranoia acting up again._

…

Soon enough, a butler opens the door for her.

"Lady Maribelle, welcome home. I apologize for my lateness." The butler said with a deep bow.

"It's quite alright. Come, Ash." She says with a regal toss of her hair.

"I'm afraid your weapons will need to be left here, sir." The butler gently, but firmly.

"Yeah, sure." I untie my sword and daggers and place them on the table.

He eyes the rail gun on my back.

But since he doesn't know what it is it doesn't count as a weapon.

_To be fair you can't really snipe indoors._

True.

…

"Mother, father, I'm home." Maribelle says with a wide smile and goes in for a hug.

A hug that her parents happily give her.

"And he is…" Her mother says with a glint in her eyes.

Oh. Oh no. Oh hell no.

"I am her guard for the trip." I say with a bow.

I am not going down that route. Ever.

"Ah, I see." She says, a little dejected. "Thank you for your services."

Maribelle sighs slightly. "Mother, you weren't hoping that this man is somehow my fiancé, were you?"

I am not dressed for the part, for the record. I'm wearing a fresh suit of armor with certain areas (namely, where the rail gun straps cut into my shoulders) reinforced by iron.

Also, she skipped the boyfriend/girlfriend phase.

_We do not cut a very dashing or noble image. And remember that marriage for love among the nobility wasn't exactly the most common thing back in the day._

"No, of course not." Her mother says with an air of nonchalance.

...

And then the three of them gets to play catch up while I get shooed out of the room.

…

The mansion is pretty sparse. It looks and feels like a rich person's house, but in a way that suggests that the family in it isn't exactly very well off.

I wonder if that makes them landowners around here.

_Traditional medieval nobles tend to be landowners, since traders weren't exactly held in high regard._

Yeah. Not sure if that pattern is in play in Fire Emblem though.

"I trust the trip was without danger, sir Ash?" The butler asked, watching me wander around the house.

"Apart from the occasional Risen, nothing of notice." I say.

_Undead Vapor Zombies are now "nothing of notice."_

I know, right? Humans are weird.

The butler chuckles. "I see; you seem to be quite skilled as a fighter. Lady Maribelle can be a little difficult to get along with, but I hope you will continue to favor her with your friendship."

I laugh. "A little? She's really difficult to get along with. I don't know what she's thinking half the time."

"She allowed you to accompany her on this trip; I assume you were given the job per suggestion from Lady Lissa?"

They're good friends. I almost forgot. "Yes, I did."

"Then she has at least decided to tolerate you." The butler laughs, accompanied by some of the maids around them. "That, for her, is a large step forward."

I'll say.

…

_Stop beating around the bush?_

Yeah.

"I have a question for you."

"Go ahead, sir Ash."

"Who are the people sneaking around the house?"

The butler froze for a fraction of a second. "You are aware that Emmeryn doesn't have total popularity among the nobility, correct?"

I nod, trying to look casual. "I had assumed as much, yes."

There were a lot of nobles whispering around the castle nowadays. Given that they weren't there before it didn't take a genius to guess what made them speak out all of a sudden.

"Maribelle's parents are one such family, and they do not approve of her…position, in the Shepherds."

He turns his head and looks at me. "Protect them. I beg of you. Protect them from this idiotic decision of theirs."

…

_Shit._

...

I dash to the door to grab my sword moments before I hear glass shatter and doors being kicked in.

Fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck

_Go upstairs, go go go!_

"Ash! What is this infernal racket" Maribelle manages to say before…

Someone in plain, villager clothing jumps through the window.

These guys are smart.

Charge him.

The man raises his dagger, but my sword has longer reach and I stab him on the shoulder.

The weight on my back makes it hard to maneuver but something tells me I should hold on to my gun's status as a weird looking toy.

Two more men burst through the door.

"Drop your weapon, guardsman. You're making our jobs harder." I hear a voice behind me.

Turn my head and look.

…

From a window I didn't see, someone else jumped in and has a Maribelle in a choke hold and at knife point.

"You brute! Unhand me!" She shouts.

The man sighs and stabs her in the back with the knife, drawing blood but judging by Maribelle's expression it wasn't dangerous to her life.

"We're in charge here, bitch. I suggest you shut your mouth before we do something worse." The man says in her ear.

"Sir Ash, drop your sword." Maribelle's father says softly.

"You were behind this, weren't you." I say quietly.

He nods. "This country needs a better king. Emmeryn is far too soft."

Damn.

"Do what the man said, brat. Drop your weapon." Maribelle's handler snarls.

Can I break out of this?

How can I break out of this?

"I won't say it again. Drop. Your. Weapon." The knife goes a little deeper. Maribelle doesn't even flinch.

I guess we know why Brady is a badass.

_Let's do this._

I drop my sword.

"Good boy." The man says dryly.

My left wrist is still pointed at his face.

Focus spell power…

Fire arm nail one.

The man's head reels back as a nail suddenly finds itself implanted in his head.

I twist around. There's four, five of them behind me.

Firing arm nail two.

Now there're four alive and one crippled.

"Window! Now!" I shout at her.

Maribelle scrambles out of the window and I follow suit, using the little time window we've got from the surprise of having nails suddenly fired at them to get some distance across the rooftops.

_Reload the arm gun._

Reloading.

"Ash, how did you…" Maribelle gasps out, finally having had enough and needing to take a break.

"Your butler warned me." I say, unslinging my rail gun.

"I should thank him later." Maribelle says. She sounds like she's in a lot of pain. "Give me a moment." There was some shuffling behind me.

I point the rail gun at the mansion and look through my scope.

…

[3rd person camera time!]

…

The man that was in charge of the abduction walked up to Maribelle's frightened parents.

"So, you let her get away." He says with a snarl.

"We had no idea that the guard she had would be so…underhanded." Maribelle's father spat. "She can't have gone far. Pursue her!"

"Oh, she can't have gone far, indeed." The man laughs. "To think her own parents would use her as a bargaining chip, you Ylisseans are rotten to the core."

"Pah. She's a suitable sacrifice for Grima." The father said with a dismissing wave of his hand. "We are faithful worshippers of the true god. Any daughter of mine that isn't is of no importance."

"Ooh, how deliciously disgusting." The man grinned.

And then ran the father through with his sword.

"And how pathetic." The man growled. "To think that you would go against your own country. Plegia spits on your so-called loyalty."

He then turned to his men.

"Kill all of them."

And then died because his head exploded.

…

[Back to me!]

…

"Got him." I grin. He really shouldn't have been standing near that window. These adjustments are great.

Loading second round.

"You ok over there?" I ask her while not taking my sights off of the window, or the people that were now trying to stare out of said window to see where the shot came from. Oh the poor, poor pre-sniper era idiots.

_Technically Snipers exist._

"I will be momentarily." She said. "That asshole poisoned the knife." She added in an undertone.

I guess we know why Brady is a badass?

Also, to all of you idiots crowding near the window…

Here's a shot at maximum power, just for you!

…

Wow, that is a lot of red that just splattered out of the window.

We might not have run away far enough for them to miss us, but the ridge of the roof we're hiding behind gives me plenty of cover, especially since they don't know what to look for.

Still, how many did I get? Maybe all of them?

_You're oddly happy about this._

I'm trying not to think about it.

…

Refill magazine.

…

"I think the coast is a little bit clear." I sigh, after seeing no more movement from the house.

"Great. So what do we do next? Go back to Ylisstol?" Maribelle said, sounding a little strained; whatever that poison is it must be getting to her.

"Let's find you an antidote first. C'mon."

…

I have to admit, mingling with the crowd is now suddenly terrifying.

But leading Maribelle by the hand feels even more terrifying, especially because she's actually trembling.

"Did…what's going to happen to my parents?" She wondered.

"You do know they sold you out, right?" I'm still a little amazed by that fact, especially since I don't know why they would do it.

_I guess he wanted himself as king? Bit of a stretch, though._

"That may be, but they're still my parents." She said with finality.

I can't argue with that.

_Based on what we saw from the scope one of them, or maybe both of them, aren't alive anymore._

Better not tell her yet.

Sorry, Maribelle's father. I'm mildly glad that you were stabbed in the chest long enough for the man to push you away from the window and place himself squarely within my line of sight.

I guess we can spin that as "he died to protect her" in a weird twisty kind of way.

…

Ah ha, apothecary.

"Maribelle, how've you…who are…what's…" The man stuttered.

If she grew up here everyone would know her. Makes sense.

"She needs an antidote." I say sharply. The man blinks and grabs one without a second thought.

Maribelle takes it, mutters thanks, and downs it without a second thought.

"So he's finally gone and did it, that crazy bastard." The man says with no small hint of venom in his voice.

"What? Her father?" I ask him.

He nods. "The man's gotten more and more delusional after you left, Mari." She doesn't seem to mind, probably since he's known her since she was small. "I can't believe he would try to sell his own daughter."

It's not like they had money woes, right?

"Where they having money issues?" I ask.

His response is a single laugh. "As if; he hated Emmeryn and would've loved to see this country burn just to spite the poor girl."

So the misogynistic asshole had a daughter and hates the girl ruler. Where have I heard this one before?

"Come to think of it, for the past year or so he's been pretty vocal about a change of leadership. I guess he snapped." The man shrugs. "For what he's done to you…if he dies, good riddance."

…

"He never liked my father." Maribelle murmured. "So don't believe everything he said."

"I won't." But I'll keep it in consideration.

I agree with the good riddance part though.

…

I hear hooves.

"Get behind me." I say and unsling my…I'm just gonna call it a rifle from here on out because that's kind of what it is.

Look through the scope…

On the horse is a pointed hat, barely visible over the horse's head and flopping mane.

Ricken.

"Ricken, what are you doing here?" I demand as soon as he came to a halt.

"Plegia." Was his single answer.

…

_Once more with feeling!_

FUUUUUUU

.

.

.

{ === + === }

Let the science train roll out of the station!

For the record I'm only using topics that I myself are aware of

(This'll show up a lot later, where I conceptually know things but can't bring them into "reality" even with timeskipped research)


	8. From - Somewhere in Themis

"Ple-are they invading?" Maribelle asked.

"No, it's not that bad yet." Ricken shakes his head. "But Plegian troops were sighted crossing the border around here a few days ago; I'm here to warn your father."

…

Wait. Time out.

Maribelle's father is the lord of this county?

"Why are you two out here, anyways?" Ricken asked suddenly, and then noticed Maribelle clinging on to me (because knife stab wound)…

Wow, that betrayal in his eyes is immense.

So he likes her first, I see.

"Maribelle's house was ambushed, probably by Plegian spies." I say.

Ricken snaps back to attention. "What? Is her father ok?"

Uh…he's probably dead by now. "I don't know, but given the circumstances I don't think so."

Hmm…we're getting a few stares from the people on the street. Then again, three people (one with a pointy hat) and a horse tend to draw attention.

"Let's discuss this elsewhere." I say, motioning around me.

"I know just the place." Maribelle says with some forced lightness.

…

Maribelle led us to a rather upscale…I don't really want to call it an inn, since it seems to lack places to sleep, but…

_It's a restaurant._

…yeah, I guess, but it still has private rooms and all.

Given by the reaction of the storeowner to Maribelle showing up I guess she used to come here a lot; the two swapped like three words before the owner led us into a private room overlooking a nearby park.

"Ok, I think we're good." I say after taking a look outside the window.

Maribelle sipped her drink…when did she get a drink?

_And what did she get?_

Why is that important right now?

"What happened in the mansion?" Ricken asks.

Hmm…how do I present this?

"There were people laying an ambush for us." I say after a minute or so. "They were hidden around the house until some pre-determined signal and then they attacked the house at once."

"And nobody noticed?" Ricken is incredulous. I don't blame him.

I shoot a glance at Maribelle, who's staring at me, since I didn't bring up any of this information beforehand.

"I'm fairly certain all the servants noticed but were encouraged to ignore it." I sigh.

"What?" Ricken almost shot to his feet. "Then her parents planned it?"

"They seemed unusually calm during the whole thing." I don't have enough information to come to a serious conclusion.

Ricken seems to want to destroy the table for whatever reason. "I don't believe this. I don't think her parents would put her in danger."

"I don't believe it either." Maribelle said after a second.

"I don't want to believe it." But I did see the leader and her father have some sort of civil discussion before the leader shanked her dad, so there's really no point in arguing the case. "In any case, the house is probably still occupied by those guys."

"So we take it back from them. What's the problem?" Ricken said immediately.

What is the problem indeed…

I jerk my head towards Maribelle. "One of the assholes got her with a poisoned blade."

Ricken looked at Maribelle again.

"I'm perfectly fine now, Ricken." Maribelle said with a regal sigh.

Still sounds like she's forcing it.

_Or maybe you're just imaging it._

"I'll be perfectly fine here, if you insist on leaving me behind for your little…mission." She said. At least her tone of distain seems to be untouched.

"Uh…" Ricken looks at me.

"Given the choice, I would rather have you with us." I say.

Ricken nods happily.

"However…?" She was expecting that, wasn't she.

"However, I don't think we have that kind of choice." My story time senses are just screaming at me to not leave her alone. "And since they were after you, I also don't want to leave you alone."

"Why isn't the town militia doing anything?" Ricken asked suddenly.

I…I don't know, actually.

"Good question." I mutter.

"My father's mansion is reputed to be the safest house in the city." Maribelle said. "The town guards won't believe a word about it being attacked."

"Even from you?" I'm a bit shocked; that sounds like horribly un-guard-like behavior.

She gives me a blank look followed by a slight blush.

Oh. Interesting…

"Let me guess, you didn't have the best behavior as a child." I say with a grin.

Maribelle turns away, red in the face.

…

Still, her behavior as a kid shouldn't influence the guards' behavior today.

"Ricken, did you try to talk to the guards about Plegia?"

Ricken nods at my question. "Yeah, but the guard captain didn't believe me, even after I gave him my status."

Ricken would be a minor noble and a Shepherd, which would make his voice at least have some weight…

_I guess we should consider the guards compromised in some way._

Yeah.

"So they're going to be of no help." I sigh. "Fine; what else do we have?"

"I could take the mansion." Ricken said matter-of-factly. "My magic is pretty good, after all."

…

"I am sure, Ricken…however, we are against those who have no regards for the rules of combat." Maribelle said after we had a moment to digest what Ricken said.

"I can do it." Ricken insists.

_Is this his stubborn "I want to be an adult" trait acting up?_

Probably. I don't want to babysit him for the time being though.

"That's great, Ricken." I sigh. "For the time being, sit here with Maribelle. I want to take another look at the mansion.".

"What? Why can't I go with you?" He sounds a bit whiny now.

"Because we can't leave Maribelle alone and you have the most firepower out of all of us here." I head for the door. "So keep her safe, got it?"

I leave before Ricken can complain more.

…

Even with that being said, I'm not quite sure exactly what I'm gonna _do_ out here.

_You can snipe. Maybe you could clear the mansion?_

I probably should, but I don't think I could do it after those guys wise up to people dying when they're near windows.

…I suppose I should just watch the mansion like I said I would.

_It's a mildly large house with large-ass windows. What are you planning to gain by observing it?_

…

Welp, there's the house, in all of its slightly run-down splendor.

_It's made of not-wood._

How very astute.

_There doesn't seem to be any guards posted on the outside._

Implying that the asshats weren't looking to occupy the house. This is probably not good for everyone inside the house that isn't on their side.

_If we take too long thinking of what to do next there's a very good chance that they'll kill the entire household and move on. We did kind of kill the guy giving them money._

Oops.

Uh…well, shit. Let's just stare through a telescope that doubles as a scope for a few more minutes.

_OY_

…

I don't see any movement from the windows I can see. I wonder if that means the house is empty.

Hmm…

Focus spell power, load one nail…half power…

_FVOOM~ Hit on window. It's shattered into pieces now._

Wait for it…wait for it…

…

…

It's been a minute. Nothing. No reaction from inside the house at all.

So the house is either totally deserted or the…oh wait, nevermind. One of the would-be bad guys is looking out the window with his sword drawn.

Except the people that gathered on account of the broken glass just saw him and probably have called the guards.

…

Oh shit I didn't think this through, did I?

_And now we're hoping that the guards are corrupt and in league with the Plegian attackers so the asshats inside don't panic and kill everyone…no, I don't think we thought this through at all._

…

"Ash, what did you do?" Maribelle asked with a sigh the instant I opened the door back to the hiding room.

I'm very, very tempted to lie through my teeth on this one.

"I watched the mansion for any movement." I say.

"And?" Ricken asked eagerly. There's someone sitting beside him that I don't recognize.

"And there's a suspicious lack of movement. I think they're all waiting for something." I sit.

Ooh, water.

"So, can we take back my home?" Maribelle asked, shooting a glance at the mystery man.

"My men should be able to overwhelm the Plegian ruffians with no issue." He says proudly.

"Who are you?" I ask.

"I am just a mercenary captain, good sir." He said with a slight bow. "The proprietor of the store informed me that our fair lady is in need of our services, and my men are here to help in any way we can."

_The owner of this place knows Maribelle pretty well, remember?_

Would explain why she opted to look for some outside help. Can't help but feel like this is really too convenient though.

_What, where people trip over themselves trying to help you? It comes with having money and influence._

"I see. Much obliged; we need all the manpower we can get." Though to be honest I'm pretty relieved; Ricken sucks at melee and I'm not that much better, and storming a house is a close quarter combat thing.

I kind of wish I worked out the whole magical melee combat thing by now, though.

_You only had time for one project._

"Ash?" Ricken asks.

"What's up?" _Slang._

"Uh…" Ricken blinks. "Nevermind; can we take back the mansion now?"

"Eh…might be a bit tough; the place has attracted some attention due to broken windows." The ones I jumped out of, definitely not the ones I broke a few minutes ago. Nope.

Maribelle why are you looking at me like that

"That shouldn't be a problem; the guards know who we are." The mercenary captain said proudly.

_Possible red light._

If the guards are compromised, then this band might be compromised as well.

…

Oh well, beggars can't be choosers.

"Alright, then I'll let you guys spearhead the operation." I say, with a remarkable tone of command, if I do say so myself.

"We won't fail you, sir." The mercenary captain grins.

_Beware of backstabbing…_

Beware of paranoia, too.

…

…

The mansion's outside is…not exactly deserted. There's a few people milling about, hoping to catch something interesting.

There are no guards, though.

_They probably just dispersed the curious and then left._

Probably.

"Looks like the coast is clear." Ricken said from next to me.

We're on the roof, hiding. The mercenary captain is with us, too.

_Us being…_

Me, Ricken, Maribelle.

_Whatever happened to her being too injured?_

Having her around is just generally safer for her and for us, since she can heal and we, y'know, can't.

"Shall we move in then, sir?" The mercenary captain said with a whisper.

_You don't know his name still._

Every time I asked he would turn the conversation in a different direction.

_How curious._

"Go." Ricken said with a nod.

The captain nods and whistles.

…

The people milling around outside the mansion draw their weapons and charge into the mansion's door with a loud bang.

…

Gotta give them props, these guys know what they're doing.

"Shall we?" The captain's grinning.

We drop from the roof and head into the mansion.

…

Wow, this place is…not as trashed as I thought it was. The interior isn't exactly in stellar shape due to having two bands of very violent people charging through it, but on the whole it lacks the looting and ransacking that I expected from the pro-Plegia group.

I can hear the sound of combat from a distance away.

_Meaning the Plegian folk were all concentrated in one room; you'd think they would've ran away at this point._

Yeah. Something's up.

"Captain, go see to your men." I say.

He looks at me in surprise, grins, and the leaves.

_Huh. I was expecting more resistance._

Yeah.

"I suppose the danger has passed now." Maribelle sighed. "Honestly, these men have no class at all."

"Which ones, the Plegian guys or the mercenaries?" Ricken asks, while we head upstairs after the captain.

"Both." She huffs.

…

The door to the room is wide open, to nobody's surprise, I think…

Let's see…

All the servants are gathered here. They look a tad beaten up but seem to be fine on the whole.

_I was expecting more violence toward the womenfolk._

I guess they were polite assholes?

Either way, what's left of the Plegian men are being held at sword point by the mercenaries.

The giant blood splatter that is the remnants of the enemy captain and some of the more curious baddies are still on the ground.

_That's probably never going to wash out._

"Sir, he was like this when we arrived." One of the men said apologetically, gesturing toward the headless Plegian body.

Ricken frowned. "That's…quite impressive."

"Did I miss something?" I mutter.

"Ah, of course." The captain said with a bow. "Our orders were to take the enemy alive if possible, per Lady Maribelle's orders."

Oh.

…oh well.

_Zero remorse?_

Zero remorse.

"Captain, what should we do about them?" One of the friendly mercenaries asked, pointing to the Plegian men.

"Please! Spare us! We'll do anything you say!" One of the Plegian men blurted out in utter terror.

While staring at Maribelle.

…

Are Fire Emblem citizenry superstitious? Because if Maribelle existed in the real world and people's heads suddenly exploded she'd be labeled a witch.

_I think they would be: magic exists but it's pretty cleanly defined to do only a handful of things._

Maribelle gave me an odd look. "Why did you target me?" She demanded from the soldier.

"I don't know your ladyship; we were just paid for the job!" The man said.

"Very handsomely too." One of his friends muttered before getting a jab in the ribs.

"And so you followed your boss to kidnap a noble regardless of the hordes of guards that try to stop you?" I ask.

"Our ex-captain" Oh, so he's an ex-now? "said that the guards wouldn't raise a finger; they were too deep in…the pockets of someone."

_You shot him. That kind of makes him an ex._

"Someone? Who?" Maribelle asks.

"I don't know, your ladyship."

Hmm…I guess it's pretty pointless to interrogate the small fry.

"What happened to your captain?" Our Mercenary Captain asked.

"We…we don't know either. One minute he was standing by the window and the next moment his head exploded."

_That would be our handiwork._

Let's see…

Wow, that is disgusting.

I'm gonna pretend I can't see the vivid detail that is an exploded head.

And…the father is right there. Complete with a knife in his chest.

"What were the two of them talking about before they died?" I ask.

"Sir?"

Were none of them here when they talked?

"The two of them." I gesture to the headless captain and Maribelle's dead father. "What were they talking about before they died?"

"I…" Ok, shifty eyes.

The mercenary captain rests his sword near the man's neck. "His lordship asked you a _question, _Plegian."

"They were…that man" he points to Maribelle's dad "wanted to sell her" he points to Maribelle "as a gift for joining Plegia."

…

_That's bad, right?_

"My father would never do such a thing." Maribelle snapped quickly.

"I'm telling the truth! I swear upon" He bites the last word.

Yeah, swearing upon Grima wouldn't be very helpful at a time like this.

"Where does your loyalty lie, mercenary?" I ask him.

He stares in terror at me.

"With your captain, or with money?"

"With money, sir." He says after a moment and a calming breath.

Hmm…

_He could be lying._

Yeah, but there's literally zero gain for him to lie right now.

"Ash, don't tell me you believe this nonsense." Maribelle's…going to be very, very angry at me.

Also I saw the two talk before her dad got shanked, so there's that.

"I see no reason for him to lie about this."

OW

FUCK

DUDE

"I see." Maribelle taps her parasol over her shoulder like it's a baseball bat. "Any other insights you wish to share with me?"

I don't see how she needs to be protected. Like, at all.

Also I'm just begging for a second hit at this point.

"Ricken, what happens to the county when its ruling lord dies?" I ask him. Because I really don't know.

"Huh, uh…" He thinks for a bit. "The title is passed to the next living family member."

Which would be Maribelle's mother, I take it.

…

"Where is she, anyways?"

"Who?"

"Your mother."

Maribelle looks around, and then points her parasol into one of the Plegian Merc's faces. She doesn't even need to say anything.

"She escaped that way!" The man points frantically to a broken window. "We stopped watching her for a second and she fled!"

_Explains the shadow we barely saw._

What shadow? I saw no shadow.

"Did you send any men to pursue?" I ask.

"No sir, our orders were to capture the lady. But when our captain died…" Their drive to kidnap died with him.

How nice of them.

Maribelle's still scowling hard.

"Uh…Mari, you're kind of scaring the" OH HOLY SHIT I really shouldn't have done that.

"What. Did. You."

_I imagine she's not in the best of mood right now._

Yeah, I kind of got that. Mother of god that thing hurts.

_Maybe she sharpens her parasol._

"Sorry, sorry." I rub my leg. I'm very glad she didn't opt for a stab. "But, uh, judging by your reaction your mother isn't the 'run away from danger' type."

"Damn straight. We're a family of nobles, after all." Maribelle sneers.

_That didn't sound like your everyday fire emblem language._

"What shall we do with them, sir?" The mercenary captain asked after a minute.

"Mercy!" The Plegian mercenary said after meeting eyes with Maribelle.

I don't blame him.

I wave at our Mercenary captain to tell him to get his sword away from the man.

"What will you do if we let you leave?" I ask him.

"We swear that we will never enter Ylissean lands again! Upon my family's honor!" Nice to see he found something else to swear on instead.

But that isn't what I'm looking for.

The man yelps when a puff of fire ignites very, very close to his face.

I'm glad I have my spell book.

"I doubt you became a mercenary for the thrill of combat." I say. The man nods furiously.

_Is that a yes or a no?_

"Thus, I am asking you. What will you do if we let you go?" Ignore the sound of Maribelle impatiently tapping her parasol against her shoulder…by the way: it is now blatantly clear where Brady got his behaviors from.

"We will…" The man looks like he wants to say something, but can't.

"Plegia is not known for its hospitality, sire." The Mercenary Captain said. "If they were to go home then the only course of action for these men would be to continue working as mercenaries…or worse."

"Sir!" Wow they sound desperate.

_Y'know…_

I'm worried about how loyal they would be if they are offered a bigger paycheck, but that being said…if they gave up on their captain so quickly their paycheck must've been pretty small.

Plus, I don't have the money to support a mercenary troop and keep them paid.

"Ash." Maribelle said. "If you are unable to carry out your duties toward Ylisse, then I will."

"I'm sure." I sigh. "Remember that there's a Plegian army marching here in a few days, too." I look at the Plegian man. "How do you think your own forces will treat you?"

"Like trash." Another (older) man grumbled. "Plegian mercenaries hired by the army is expendable; why do you think we were out here to begin with?"

To make some money without dying, I suppose.

"Do you have family?" I ask softly.

The older man chuckled in response.

"I've heard enough." Ricken said with a sigh. "What's wrong with killing a few Plegians that their own countrymen won't miss?"

Whoa, wait. Wait.

"That's a very harsh thing to say, Ricken." I'm surprised as hell that you would say it.

"Well, it's the facts." Ricken said, wind swirling around him. "They attack the house and killed Maribelle's father in a cowardly attempt to kidnap her. They don't deserve to live." He nods towards the Mercenary Captain…

Who nods back.

…

"Ricken, that didn't solve any of our problems." I scowl.

He watches the living friendly mercenaries drag the dead enemy ones out of the room. "It didn't look like you were willing to make the decision."

_That's true._

"Besides, if they cared about their family they would've stayed with them." He said bitterly.

_Remember that he's still a kid._

Yeah, but still.

"Ash, enough. You will not protect those who attacked me." Maribelle said with finality.

"Fine, fine." But I still think you've made a huge mistake. "What would happen if this place goes to Plegia?"

"If Plegia takes Themis?" Ricken scratches his head.

"Yeah."

"Themis has extremely rich farmland." Maribelle says proudly. "We produce most of the food for Ylisse."

"If Themis gets taken then Ylisse would lose its export revenue, I think." Ricken sounds a bit unsure. "Sorry, I didn't pay all that much attention in class."

Which means Themis is a major port, if we're talking foodstuffs being transported without refrigeration…

_Which means Themis produces non-perishable goods for export. C'mon man, pay attention._

"Themis has sea access, right?" I ask Maribelle.

She nods. "Themis has the largest trading port in Ylisse." She then scowls. "If Plegia takes it then we'll be cut off from the sea."

Of course, we could just cut the middle man and go straight into chapter five, and then snipe Gangrel before the war even begins.

_I don't think that will actually end the war. Hell, it might even galvanize the Plegians._

Probably.

"So what do we do?" Ricken asked.

"I shall protect my home, with any means I see fit." Maribelle said proudly.

"So you're not going to leave? Ylisstol's pretty good this time of year." I say idly.

She shoots me a dirty look.

"With my father gone and my mother missing, I am now the lady of Themis. I will not abandon my people in their time of need." She says, standing proud and tall.

This means we're looking at a major skirmish before chapter five rolls around.

This is honestly not on the brochure of things I expected to see while time travelling, but what the hell.

In for a penny, in for a pound.

"Can we send a message back to Ylisstol for reinforcements?" I ask.

"I don't think they'll make it in time though." Ricken sighed as he left the room.

"You could deliver the message yourself." Maribelle said.

"I would, but then I would miss the action." I shrug.

"Pardon?"

I look at her square in the eyes. Eye to eye contact makes –me- nervous, not her.

_The perils of being introverted. Also watch out for sappiness._

"I figured you would stay and duke it out." And I expect the town guards to be utterly useless. "I don't feel like leaving a friend to fend for herself."

"I am not some damsel in need of rescue." Maribelle huffed, but she's smiling a little.

_She didn't have a lot of friends, if memory serves. Lissa was like the only person._

"I can tell." I laugh.

Ricken comes in a few seconds later. "I sent a messenger. I don't think we'll be getting reinforcements though, so what's our plan?"

The mercenary captain walks in after him. "Am I to understand that the three of you will be fighting a Plegian army by yourselves?"

Ricken's staying?

What am I thinking…of course he's staying.

"Looks like it." I say lightly.

"I see." The mercenary captain bows and says nothing else.

Ricken snaps his fingers. "Ash! I forgot." He pulls out something from one of his pockets. "This was delivered for you; Miriel wanted me to deliver it. Here." He said with a grin.

I take it.

Fuck yes: it's the scope I ordered.

It's even better than I imagined.

"Looks like you just received a birthday gift." Maribelle said, looking at the idiotic grin on my face.

Oh, you have no idea, Maribelle.

You have no idea.

_That scope won't make you shoot any straighter. You know that, right?_

Shh little voice in my head, don't ruin this for me.

…

…

The Mercenary Captain clears this throat, effectively ruining the moment.

"While I do admire your bravery, princess, might I suggest that you rethink your course of action?" He said with a low bow.

"Prin…I'll have you know that title is restricted only to Lissa, the Princess of Ylisse." Maribelle sounds really…uh, insistent about that.

"Of course, of course. " The man idly adjusts his sword. "Regardless, I believe that having you stay here would be detrimental to my mission, and my salary."

Ricken tugged at his hat. "I paid you to keep Maribelle safe."

"And I do not believe going into a war would consider 'safe'." The mercenary captain sighed.

…

Well, shit.

"To be fair, he's right." I say.

"Ash." Maribelle's not happy.

"Look, in the end, if you want to stay and fight it out, I'm here for you." I raise my hands. "However, he is right. What do we realistically have in this fight?"

"What do you mean?" Ricken asks.

"There's the three of us, maybe the town guards, and maybe these guys." I motion to the mercenaries. "How do you plan to actually fight an army?"

Silence.

"I mean, does Ylisse conscript troops?"

"Conscript?" Ricken doesn't seem to know what that means. I assume no then.

"Basically raising an army regardless if the people want to be a soldier or not."

"Ylisse used to do that, but Emmeryn put an end to it." The Mercenary Captain said.

_In just ten years?_

I imagine a move like that would be pretty easy to accomplish since your everyday villager is not exactly fond of dying.

"Besides, there's not much chance of the common man answering a rally until the enemy is on our doorstep. And by then it would be far too late, considering the current mood of the people…" The captain finished with a tiny chuckle.

"More importantly…" I'm thinking out loud here. "Maribelle's family goes missing, Plegia immediately attacks, the new lord of Themis is forced to levy for a short but bloody battle…"

I look at Maribelle.

"This doesn't look good at all, does it?"

She rolls her eyes.

"How astute of you." Such biting sarcasm. "However, if Plegia occupies Themis, all of Ylisse suffers."

"But if Ylisse has an army instead of a militia, then we can take it back quickly." Ricken murmurs. He then looks at Maribelle. "I think he might be right here; we should report back to Chrom first before doing anything like mobilizing for a war."

_It's entirely possible we're still on rails at this point._

I don't think Plegia is going to mobilize an entire army just for a lone girl, regardless of her station.

…

"Pah. Fine." Maribelle huffs at last. "We'll report back to Chrom. So let's get going now."

Wait…now?

It's the…what time is it.

Dark out.

"It's pretty late right now." Ricken points out. "We won't get very far before we'll have to fight the Risen when they show up."

…

I had actually forgotten about the vapor zombies at this point, wow.

Maribelle grits her teeth. "Yes, yes…we'll leave early tomorrow."

"I shall make the preparations immediately; we'll also handle the patrols for the night, so don't worry about a thing, your highness." The Mercenary Captain sounds a lot like Harrison Ford, come to think of it, it's a little weird.

…

…

So Maribelle decided to wake me up really early today.

With the help of one of her maids.

And a lot of cold water.

_This is like your first shower in this week._

That might be why, actually.

Oh well.

…

So we left the town before the sun had even risen.

Speaking of Risen, there are Risen outside the walls, but they're pretty chill about the whole thing.

About the whole being shot at by guards on top of walls thing.

So we ignored them.

…

Maribelle is also not happy that we're being forced to travel at the same speed as the Mercenary group.

Y'know, since we're on horseback and all of them are on foot (with the exception of the captain).

"I can't see why we can't just leave them behind." Maribelle had said during lunch.

"All we know about Plegia is that they have an army around here somewhere." Ricken said.

"It seems a little weird for them to be coming at us from the direction of Ylisse." I'm not quite sure how that would work.

"I agree…however, I don't think we would've expected Plegia to assault the lord of a town…" The Mercenary Captain said.

…Point to him, I suppose.

…

[Three days later]

…

FUUUCK THIS IS SLOW

Oh. Wandering Risen.

Good.

DEATH TO ALL OF YOU BECAUSE I'M BORED

_No, we're not going insane at all._

…

"Sir, I have something to report." I hear the captain say to Ricken.

"What is it?" Ricken was busy wiping his sword clean.

_Whoa wait what?_

I know, right? Ricken knows how to handle a blade. Not on the same level as the mercenaries, obviously, but he does use it to complement his magic.

In that he blasts the unfortunate Risen with a shot of wind to stagger it and then runs it through with his sword. The overall damage output is pretty…uh, not very good, considering how often we had to bail him out of a near-death situation, but the morale benefits of watching a small child go toe to toe with a zombie is pretty huge.

I guess Chrom's leadership qualities rubbed off on him.

"The landscape up ahead is unpleasant." The captain said, gesturing to the…rolling plains dotted with trees up ahead.

_That is the most nonsensical bullshit reason I have ever heard._

Apparently Ricken agrees. "What does that mean?"

"It means the captain has a bad feeling, kid." One of the mercenary underlings said in passing.

"It still is the fastest way to Ylisse from here. The choice is yours." The Captain shrugged and left.

"Ash, what do you think?" Ricken asked once he noticed me listening in.

"I think I would love to have a Pegasus at this point; have the mercenaries deploy some scouts, I suppose?" I'm not quite sure what we could do about it.

"Yeah, that sounds good." Ricken nods. "Hey! Hey captain!" and runs off to catch the man.

…

…

I can see what he meant by a bad feeling.

…

No, no I really can't. It's like flat grassland with orchards on either side of the main path. We must be pretty close to a village or a manor for there to be agriculture all the way out here, and there's a little devastation damage due to Risen.

But I don't see how this would be dangerous for us.

_What did we say about tempting fate?_

…

Ah…fuck.

I draw my sword. I can't hit worth shit on horseback anyways.

"Expecting trouble?" The captain asked.

"Not really. Just read too many stories." I laugh.

Which is true: I'm basing my real life assessment of the situation on stories with plot progression.

_I think we've gone full meta at this point._

…

And now I'm on the ground.

What the hell?

…

From behind the orchards…

Fucking Plegians.

…

They were dressed like the farmers.

_Gotta give them points for effort._

How long have they been planning this?

_Look closer._

The clothing of the men…are disheveled and obviously torn in several places. So they did this really fucking fast…unbelievable.

"Captain! What are you doing?!" Maribelle demanded.

"Fulfilling my contract." The captain said with a laugh. "I'm very glad Plegia is paying me extra for putting up with your shit."

Maribelle is incensed.

Ricken pulls out his spellbook.

I'm still on the ground. I fell off my horse, ok?

_You were shot off your horse. In case you didn't realize due to the adrenaline, your right side is pretty burnt._

"Then…" Ricken is scowling.

"You got it, kid. We were in it from the start." The mercenary captain laughed. "I gotta tell ya, I don't know who those idiots were when they hit the house but they sure as hell made it easier on us."

_The men were Plegian, right?_

They certainly seemed like it.

_That means there's a faction war in Plegia that we can probably take care of._

That's a little too long term right now, brain.

"Well, I imagine they would've made our jobs easier had it not been for you." The captain said, looking at me as I get back on my feet. "An unreasonably powerful wizard indeed, to have predicted an ambush…"

_Wait, this means he wanted us to take a secondary path._

Which meant…they assaulted, cleaned up, and dressed up within the timespan of an hour or so?!

"You give me too much credit." I smile for effect. "What do you want out of all this?"

"Me? Just a nice bonus with my salary." He shrugs. "I'm a professional, you know? No hard feelings. I think Plegia wants something else entirely though." He grins and gestures to a man in a large black cloak.

What is it with Plegia and stuffy-looking cloaks?

"Our terms are simple." The very young-sounding man said. I wasn't expecting what was essentially a college freshman under that getup. "Give us the lady of Themis, and we'll leave the land alone."

…

That is total bullshit, if they weren't holding all the cards.

"That sounds like the dumbest deal I've ever heard." Maribelle huffs.

The cloaked man…kid, bristles. You need thicker skin, dude. "It is the concession that Grima is willing to give."

I can't take him seriously at all. Not with that voice of his. Not even when we're surrounded by like sixty people.

_Imagine a poorly acted amateur video with a guy that isn't used to acting at all, and you'll get the picture._

"You can either agree to come with us, or be dragged off by force." The Kid-in-a-blanket said.

"My men will guarantee your safety, princess." The Mercenary Captain said with a small bow. "Should you decide to come with us…"

"Please do resist." One of the soldiers muttered. "We can do whatever we want if you do."

Well, that's not foreboding at all.

Maribelle gives the kid-in-a-blanket her most savagely withering upturned-nose look. "So be it, child." I think she's actually younger than he is. "So long as you leave my fair county unharmed."

The kid visibly relaxes. "Upon Grima and our honor, we will." Some of the soldiers groan. "I know not what my king plans for you, but rest assured it will be great."

"I'm sure." Maribelle said scathingly, riding forward…

Then turns her head and catches my eye, with the barest of a smirk.

_We're back on the rails now, isn't that wonderful?_

I am way too happy about all of this.

…

…

Ricken and I ride a little slowly onwards.

Largely because Ricken is a little paralyzed by the whole thing.

…

[Night]

…

So…the night started off ok.

We stopped at a roadside inn.

Well, more of a farm-inn mix.

And then Ricken…I guess, snapped, I dunno.

Either way he's pinned me against stable wall with his sword at my neck.

_You seem pretty ok with this._

I'm a little too surprised to be panicked, to be honest.

He also seems to be mumbling something under his breath.

"Uh…dude? If you had any great ideas on how we could've broken out of that surround back there, I'd love to hear it." I say.

His response is a blast of cutting wind to my face.

_That might not have been the best thing to say._

You think?

At least he took the sword off of my neck.

"It doesn't bother you?" Ricken said after a few minutes, sounding like he picked something diplomatic to say only after great difficulty.

_In order words, what we just heard was WHAT THE FUCK WERE YOU THINKING_

As spoken by a kid, yeah. "It does. I would love to just murder the shit out of all of them." I take a deep breath. "But Maribelle put the safety of Themis over her life."

Holy shit wrong thing to say.

Dodge the second blast of wind.

"Let me finish." Jesus Christ. "She knew what she was getting into, and it's going to be our job to get her out of this idiotic mess."

Ricken isn't convinced.

I sigh. "Look. If you have any bright ideas about how we can play the hero, I'd love to hear it. I really do. Right now though? This is reality. We don't have the manpower to take her back unharmed, and we're going to Ylisse to get that manpower. Alright?"

"You could've done something." He's…very accusing with his tone.

"And what would've happened, pray tell?" I sound exasperated, probably because I am.

Silence.

"They were willing to kill off god knows how many people to get this plan in motion." I…have just come to realization with that fact. "Correction, they killed off god knows how many people to get the plan into motion. It's fair to say that if we had actively resisted there would be two dead mages and a very unhappy Maribelle."

_That's putting it amazingly lightly._

Ricken takes a deep, and I mean DEEP, breath. "When we talk to Chrom though I'm going to be the first one to get her out of there."

_Wherever there might be._

"That's the spirit." I smile.

He reluctantly grins in return. "Sorry about, the, uh." He gestures in my general direction.

"No worries."

…

[Later that Night]

…

_Still up?_

Still up.

_Sheesh…what should we do about chapter five?_

Better question: why did they go so far for Maribelle?

_She's not really important as far as the plot goes; this invasion into Themis is pretty much a cause for war on its own._

It is, but I guess "well we wanted a girl so we invaded a country" isn't exactly a great rallying flag.

_Maybe she has something special that the Grimleal could use? Like Robin?_

Apart from the breadbasket that is called Themis, I don't know.

_It's entirely possible that they…how much does she have over her county anyways?_

Uh…it's Medieval Times, so assume a fair amount…

_It's entirely possible they might use her as a political leverage to turn Themis into a Plegian holding. You can get a lot done with mind control and strong arming, especially when information denial is added into the mix._

I am just thinking out of my ass at this point.

_Here are some illustrated possibilities of total and utter insane conspiracy theories that Plegia might be trying_

GO. TO. SLEEP.

_Here are some_

UUUUGH

…

[Next day]

…

The next two days passed with us riding as hard as we possibly can towards Ylisstol.

Since we had used the "shortest possible path" as suggested by the Mercenary captain (whose advice I'm starting to doubt) we came to the…

Well, I came to the conclusion and didn't tell Ricken

We came to the conclusion that the messenger must have either been intercepted or wasn't keen on delivering the message to begin with. Which means nobody at the castle knows what's going on.

Which means we're booking it home, to the detriment of our horses.

…

[Next day, again]

…

Castle Ylisstol! Oh how I missed that magnificient looking wall! Finally, we can have someone to talk to again!

_Ricken didn't count?_

I don't think he trusted himself to keep his temper under control if he opened his mouth, so our trip for the past two days has been very silent.

…

Is it just me, or does the castle town feel more…subdued, than before?

Almost like there's something missing.

"Ash! Ricken!" I hear Fredrick call out.

Turn. He's riding in on his armored horse along with Sully, Stahl, and a handful of the rapid response cavalry.

"Fredrick, good to see you."

"Indeed. Pardon my lack of pleasantries, but why is Lady Maribelle not with you?" He sounds…very worried.

_The "oh shit" alarm is going off now._

"It's…why, what happened here?" Ricken's frown tells me he's thinking along the same lines I am.

"Damn." Fredrick shook his head. "Let's get back to the castle; I fear the worst."

Uh…

Fredrick?

We're a little on edge right now.

Can we not have more bad news please?

…

…

"Here." Fredrick motioned ushered us into a room in the shepherd barracks.

Something feels very, very wrong here.

Also there's Donnel, getting some tips on weapon usage from Vaike of all people.

_Mood whiplash much? Pay attention._

"Ok, what happened to Maribelle?" Fredrick demanded as soon as the door closed.

Hmm…start from the top, then.

…

…

…

"I see…and do you know why Plegia had made such a brazen move?" Fredrick asked with a scowl after I finished explaining.

"I have some guesses, but that's all they are." I shake my head.

"Well, at the very least, we're in luck there." Fredrick sighed. "Yesterday afternoon a suspicious group was seen travelling very quickly to the Plegian border…it's fair to say that this is the group we're referring to." He then raised hand to stop Ricken from interrupting. "we've already tasked the Pegasus Knights to look into it; odds are, Chrom will be moving in two days."

Two

"Why not tomorrow?" Ricken and I demand.

"Because things haven't gone smoothly on this end either." Robin said from the doorway. "Pardon the intrusion."

Fredrick gives a noncommittal shrug.

"What do you mean?" I'm now a mixture between worried, confused, and terrified.

"Chrom was injured during a patrol a few days ago; it'll take him a little while to get back on his feet."

Ricken shot up and left the room in a _serious_ hurry.

"I don't blame him." Fredrick sighed. "If you'll excuse me." He got up and left the room as well.

Something doesn't add up here.

"Ash, what was supposed to happen this time in the timeline?" Robin asked once she shut the door.

Uh…

"Maribelle was supposed to go to somewhere close to the Plegian border and get kidnapped for her troubles." I'm squeezing my eyes shut, trying to remember the original plot without any embellishments.

"And you went to make sure it happened?" She said lightly.

"I went to make sure it didn't happen." I snarled a little harder than I intended there. "But obviously I came up short."

_A lot harder than you intended._

"I see." Robin sounded slightly apologetic. "And what happens after that?"

Uh…

"The Shepherds mobilize to save her when Plegia decides to use her as a bargaining chip and declares war." I think that's how it went.

"That's…" Robin sighs. "I see."

"So explain to me why Chrom needs to rest for two days instead of getting patched up by Lissa?"

Robin froze.

…

Shit.

"What happened to Lissa?"

"Uh…" Robin shifts nervously.

"Robin. Don't make me find out from someone else. What. Happened?"

Robin takes a deep breath. "Lissa went missing shortly after we realized that Chrom had been injured. We have reason to believe that she was…taken."

Taken.

_Take some DEEP breaths now._

Taking them.

"Ash, what are you-" She gets to say before I charge out of the room.

_Dude._

I am calm.

_Dude._

I…am…CALM!

.

.

.

{ === + === }

And finally we come to chapter 5.

I'm not going very fast am I...


	9. From - Chapter 5 Preparation Screen

_Dude? You haven't eaten or slept for the past two days…or drank._

I know.

_Without sleep._

I know.

_A little crazy._

I know.

…

I hear a knock on the door.

"Who is it?"

"Umm…beg pardon, sir. Lady Robin is asking for you." I hear an unrecognized voice from the door.

_Probably a maid._

I sigh. "Roger that, I'll be down there in a moment."

_Get a fresh shirt; the one you're wearing_

Is ink stained and problematic, I know, I know…

…

"Ash, are you…" Robin asks as soon as I enter the room.

Looks like we're having a conference, judging by the fact that every Shepherd is here sitting in a chair.

"I'm fine. Just…yeah. Fine." I mumble.

"If you say so." Robin frowns, but turns toward Chrom, who looks…pretty good, all things considered. "Everyone's here now, Chrom."

_Everyone except, well, y'know._

Chrom nods. "As you all are aware, two of our members have been abducted by Plegia. They have demanded that Emmeryn be present for the…ransom." He spat out.

I don't think those were Plegia's exact words.

"She has…agreed to this meeting, and we're heading out as her bodyguards." Chrom continued. "I don't think I need to tell you what our plans are."

Vaike punched his other (open) hand.

_Is there a technical term for that?_

"Yeah. We bust in and rescue our two ladies. No questions asked."

Chrom nodded. "Plegia has committed actions that would constitute a war in any other time. I will not stand by and let them play out this farce."

Chrom then looks at me, and then…at Lon'qu? Huh. "With that in mind, I need to have men dedicated to rescuing Maribelle and Lissa."

Oh, is that what it is?

"I'll get Maribelle." Ricken said firmly. "I swear it upon my family's honor." I can't see his face from here, but from his voice…he's ready to fight his way out. I seriously hope that's not actually his plan.

"Understood, and then…" Robin looks between us two. Me and Lon'qu.

I sigh. "Lon'qu, you're responsible for Lissa."

Lon'qu flinches. "And here I thought you were pining for her."

"Oh, don't worry. Just get her out of there, and I'll handle the rest."

I had 48 hours to refine and produce some of the lesser techs I didn't get working before.

Plegia won't know what hit them.

"Are you sure you're ok with this?" Robin asks with a raised eyebrow.

"Well…" I look around. "As all of you might be aware at this point, I am an Outrealmer, outsider, whatever you want to call it; there's a little theory we have that any minor alterations to a world will cause it to change in a great way, so I feel a bit responsible for getting Lissa into this mess."

Donnel looked mildly surprised that I came from the Outrealm gate, but doesn't seem to be all too bothered by it. I look similar enough to your average Ylissean, I guess.

"I see." Robin sighed. "Of the stories I've read, most Outrealmers are pretty quiet about their status." She knows about it, so I think she was just saying it for effect.

I shrug. "The world is changing. My goal is to make it change to benefit me."

Virion laughs. "Spoken like a true gentleman!"

Robin shakes her head. "Well, if that's how it is." She then looks around the table. "We will discuss our plans on the road; for now, check your gear, we leave in half an hour."

…

"Yo, Ash." Stahl claps me on the back. "Did you get any sleep?"

"Too little time." I mutter. I don't plan on sleeping a lot during the trip either, since I'm packing some of my research material and all the Spirit Dust I can realistically carry.

_In other words, about a small pouch full._

"Oh really? Get some proper rest during the journey then. Robin will have your hide if you mess up because you were too tired."

No kidding.

"I will. Thanks, Stahl."

…

…

…

_I would just like to mention that what he did during the entire week-long trip would qualify as "sleeping" under the loosest definition possible._

Shush. It's not like anyone else got their eight hours either.

…

…

…

So…we're now here at the valley of chapter five.

Robin's plan is pretty simple. We would still be bodyguards (because we still need to keep Emmeryn safe, it's not like she gets plot armor just by leaving the map here) but there will be two small detachments in the form of Lon'qu and Ricken.

Robin's assuming that both of them will be kept in largely the same area (to save space, as she called it) and both teams, as a result, will approach the targets from different areas.

Under vaguely different plans.

Ricken will be dressed as a local shepherd boy (hmm…) and skirt through the wooded hilly areas, while Lon'qu will pose as a Plegian mercenary from Chon'sin.

I added in that last bit as a bit of cover and Lon'qu nearly slit my throat.

"How many other Ylisseans do we know spell their names with an apostrophe?" Was my explanation for knowing.

_You could've just claimed immunity as an Outrealmer._

I don't think diplomacy works like that.

Anyways, Robin gave me permission to move as I pleased around the battlefield, since, as she puts it, "You are too unstable right now for me to formulate a plan around, so go do your own thing."

Which effectively makes me an NPC in this fight. Joy.

_She's right._

I know, and I'm glad.

…

…

"Ah, her…_highness_, Emmeryn." Gangrel said with a toothy grin. By the way, those commas were his pauses for effect.

"Gangrel, I have come to parley; what is your intention for hosting a diplomacy meeting here?" Emmeryn said neutrally.

"Ah, well." Gangrel snapped his fingers, and holy shit that is a lot of soldiers. "We wanted to be prepared for any other…Ylissean treachery."

Snickers from the Plegian Peanut Gallery.

Chrom narrows his eyes, but didn't say anything.

Robin's quickly scanning the surroundings, her eyes darting back and forth.

Yeah, this map was not balanced with playability in mind.

"I can assure you there will be no such thing." Emmeryn said smoothly.

_I think the funniest part is that Gangrel is actually **right **about Ylissean shenanigans**.**_

Heeheehee.

"Now then, what can you offer us in exchange for your…visitors, upon our territory?" Gangrel said with a flourish, showing us…

Maribelle and Lissa a cliff level higher. I can't see their physical status from here, but judging by the fact that they're still standing they haven't been treated too badly.

I let out my held breath. When was I hold one?

"You bully!" I hear Lissa shout as her guards escort her out of sight. She also needs better taunts.

_Estimated distance to captives, around 50 meters uphill, not counting sheer cliff face._

We can probably make it in one jump if we need to.

"Ah, as you can see, not the best of manners." Gangrel laughed. He sounds almost normal. "Well, I think…if you give us the Fire Emblem, we'll gladly return the Lady of Themis and the Princess of Ylisse. Not a bad trade, I feel."

Everyone looked suitably shocked, except, interestingly enough, Emmeryn.

_And us?_

And us.

"And what do you plan to do with the Fire Emblem once you have it?" She asked politely.

The Fire Emblem, mind you, is inside a box being held by Kellam, per Robin's suggestions.

Which means nobody here have any fucking clue where it is. I mean, I know he's right next to Stahl, but for the life of me I don't see anyone there.

"Do? It will be a national treasure, worthy of display upon the grandest of pedestals!" Gangrel says with an extravagant flourish.

…does…does he not know what it's used for? Did the Grimlead not fill him in on that?

_Cross our fingers and hope so._

"I see…the Fire Emblem has served the bloodline of Naga for countless years, it is indeed priceless. It would be…remiss of us to simply have it be cheated away." Emmeryn frowned slightly. "Though I suppose the price of a national treasure is a small one compared to that of two living, breathing people."

Gangrel shows his toothy grin. "I'm glad you think that way…"

Emmeryn smiles in kind. "But, as we have stated, it is an important part of Ylisse; it would only be in Plegia's favor if you should, say, grant us one of your officials as a sign of goodwill on the part of Plegia."

Goodwill?

"Goodwill? Plegia has no _intention_" Gangrel snarled.

But Emmeryn cut him off. "For peace to occur, both parties will need to be dedicated to mutual growth and understanding, not a system of petty give or take."

"Petty?! Ylisse seems to be fond of accusing others of wrongdoing, _Exalt_." Gangrel practically spat her title out.

"I do not accuse, Gangrel." Emmeryn's voice isn't as warm as it usually is. "I am stating a fact, as your Dark Flyer companion is well aware."

…

Note to self, Emmeryn is actually very, very terrifying when she picks up on hints.

_What kind of hints?_

The kind that implies that Aversa might be one of the bigger fishes around here.

_I suppose you don't become a master diplomat by just smiling and being nice._

"Did you tell her anything?" Robin hisses to me.

"Not a thing." I mutter in reply.

Aversa and Gangrel were at least put on the back foot for a minute.

"My reputation seems to be misunderstood, so I shall clarify." Emmeryn's voice is…very much "tranquil fury". There's no increase of volume, no change of tone, but everyone listening can tell that she means business.

"Plegia has invaded Ylisse, on multiple occasions, and with a standing army." Emmeryn walked forward, her robes flowing elegantly behind her. "My purpose, first and foremost, is the protection of my people...my country. I am an instrument of peace for that reason."

She is standing…very close to Gangrel. This is…what is this?!

_She's standing far enough to be out of strike range, though. At this point everyone is looking at her transfixed…us included._

"If you should tread on that peace and strike down my citizens for your…foolish, childish antics…then I shall gladly respond with force."

…

Can we just appreciate, for a moment, the fact that Emmeryn has called the plan to revive a giant fuckoff dragon of infinite evil "childish"?

…

"Ah…" Gangrel snarled. "War it is, then."

And with lightning speed, he dashed forward.

And was blown back with a brilliant light.

"I am the Exalt of Ylisse." Emmeryn's voice carried across the battlefield. "Our qualm is with the crown of Plegia, with the man who foolishly decided to resolve to threats and kidnapping as his first course of action." She looked down at Gangrel. "Pull back your men, Gangrel, and spare yourselves of this folly."

Gangrel smirked. "I like stubborn women."

…

_Ok. Spell circles ready._

Deploying…engage!

…

[3rd person camera]

…

Gangrel's smirk was suddenly replaced by surprise as a man from the Ylissean lines zoomed forward with incredible speed straight toward the king of Plegia.

Gangrel leapt backwards and drew his Levin sword, casting a bolt of lightning from it with one swift motion.

His attacker, however, was already in his face, and Gangrel could see the fire wrapped around the man's fist.

…

[1st person camera]

…

Sheesh…I had initiative, element of surprise, and a charging attack, and he still dodged it.

_Gangrel's probably a lot better than you are._

"The mysterious wizard, I see." Gangrel snarled, his Levin sword out in front of him.

"Nice to meet you, Gangs." I'm dimly aware that the Plegian troops and the Shepherds are too stunned to fight right now. That's gonna change real soon though.

"Hmph." Gangrel then raised his voice. "We have our war, lads! Kill them all!"

A roar from the Plegian side, and their soldiers charge down the hills (not the cliffs; they'd just fall and die).

I'm suddenly very, very glad that practically none of them were mounted.

Also Gangrel is gone. It's been like five seconds and I have no idea where he is.

Fuck that guy is fast.

_You don't become a king of a nation of "Bad Guys" by being complacent._

"Ash, was it?" I hear Emmeryn say. I turn a little; she's actually a little blinding, given that light is practically emitting from her body.

"Yes, your highness." I can't physically look at her without hurting my eyes.

"Rescue my beloved Lissa and her best friend." She says with the friendliest of smiles.

I…

I feel…power.

Like, "holy shit is this what Rally Spectrum feels like?" power.

"By your command." I bow.

…

_How's our spell power?_

Good enough, if the raging power that's inside my body is any indication.

…

[3rd Person camera]

…

Maribelle and Lissa looked on, feeling helpless as they saw the Plegian troops rush down to meet the Shepherds.

Maribelle heard Lissa fearfully mutter a sentence with the word "Chrom" in it.

"He'll be alright, Lissa; Our Prince will never die to these lowlifes." Maribelle said confidently.

"I know, I know. But still." Lissa moaned. "Look at the number of them!"

"And some of them are here, too, _princess._" The two girls turned at the savage voice.

Maribelle and Lissa, per their status as healers, were given limited amounts of freedom in the Plegian camp to work as clerics for the Plegian army (an opportunity Lissa fully embraced). Due to Lissa's never-ending optimism and adherence to the clerical code of helping _everyone _in need, the guards stationed to protect the prisoners of war worked extra hard to ensure that the girls would at least be safe from the less appealing elements of war.

At the moment, however, their guards weren't here.

"Gotta hand it to Mustafa's men; they're damned loyal when they want to be." The Plegian Captain said. "But they're not here now, are they?" He motioned to his men, many of them wearing some very nasty smirks.

"You…" Maribelle snarled.

"I didn't want to scratch that beautiful face of yours, but I'm not a picky man." The captain grins evilly. "So how long do you think it'll take an Ylissean to come up and rescue the two of you?"

"More like how many of us can these two handle?" One of the soldiers said, rousing the rest of them to laughter. Lissa instinctively cowered behind Maribelle, whose power of speech seemed to have been momentarily robbed by her fury.

"And you call yourselves soldiers?" Maribelle finally managed to say.

"Yeah. The best in Plegia." The captain cracked his knuckles. "Now then, girlies. Resist a little. This'll be more fun that way!"

Maribelle spared a glance behind her; the Shepherds were being pushed back by the sheer weight of the Plegian force. She could only guess at the effort Robin was making to make sure the Shepherds kept themselves fighting. She then looked at the Plegian captain, and against her best self-control, felt fear creep into her before it was replaced by burning fury.

The captain had nothing but Maribelle's chest in his eyes, as he continued to move forward.

"Nowhere to run now, _princess_." He taunted as Maribelle looked around for a weapon (Plegia had, in a moment of competence, confiscated her parasol).

And suddenly the poor captain found himself staring down an odd tube of sorts.

"Sup?" The man holding it said, and pulled the trigger.

…

[1st person camera]

…

"Ash?" Lissa asked, looking at me with a mix of fear and astonishment.

The fear I can understand; the Plegian asshat I was just aiming at is now missing a head.

The astonishment might have to do with the fact that I'm floating on a pair of green-ish shoes.

"Yeah. Sorry I'm late, Lisse." I…wow, Maribelle, you look like hell.

Lissa is perfectly fine, mind you. A little on the dirty and unkempt side, but otherwise of perfectly good health.

Maribelle…has marks on her face and clothes that implies that the Plegians thought nothing of roughing her up a little. I'm going to assume that she's ok underneath the clothes too.

_You're just worried if they were raped._

…Well, yeah. Not exactly a fun subject.

"Y'know." I say, turning towards the Plegian soldiers. "I was going to be like Emmeryn and give you all a chance to surrender. But I changed my mind." I aim my gun. "If you want to live, start running."

…

So how many people do I kill before my stomach stops feeling hollow?

…

…

Apparently, not enough of them.

The Plegian soldiers were shocked enough at their captain being suddenly decapitated that they couldn't move fast enough when I started shooting.

As a result, where there used to be a batch of soldiers there is now just a pool of blood and separated body parts. And moaning. And crying. And generally people who wish they died fast enough after they saw chunks of their body vanish.

"That's that. Let's get out of there." I mumble. Around twenty shots into my rampage I realized that having the two ladies I wanted to protect witness a bloody massacre might not create the best of impressions.

_And yet you finished them off anyways._

They started it.

I look back: Lissa had squeezed her eyes shut (probably when the Plegians started screaming in agony) and turned entirely away, and Maribelle's pale in the face and isn't looking at me.

"Yes, let's." Maribelle said softly.

…

"Ash! How did you get here before me?!" Ricken demanded, emerging from the nearby trees.

"I took a shortcut." I say. I say while pretending to be jovial.

Ricken, having higher intellectual capabilities than a rock, wasn't fooled. "What happened?"

"I…war happened." Oh shit there actually is still a battle going on.

I dart to the cliff side to look down.

…

The Shepherds have retreated step by step, but their capabilities are pretty evident: there's a trail of Plegian corpses between where we started and where Robin is making her stand: near the…fort-ish thing, really just the burned out remains of a house.

"Should we go help them?" Ricken asked, looking around at all three of us.

I think Maribelle and Lissa just desperately wanted something to take their mind off of the…overkill.

"What can we do from here?" Maribelle squinted her eyes. "There're too many people between us and the Ylissean lines."

"Above you!" I hear a yell.

And I look instead of dodge.

A Wyvern rider. Probably the boss of the stage.

Our eyes met, and he swerves and flies away, running from a blast of wind from Ricken.

"Ash! Are you ok?!" Ricken asks, looking at my…

Oh.

Ok.

There is a javelin embedded in my side.

Oh.

Uh…

Slightly surreal, this is.

Hmm…

I unsling my rifle as the Wyvern rider is turning around.

"Ash!" I hear Lissa yell. I'm probably losing blood right now.

Yes, pain is starting, definitely losing blood.

Focus, and aim…

…

His Wyvern charges in at a frankly terrifying speed.

Which I would be worried about…

If I wasn't cheating my ass off.

_FVOOM!_

_…_

What's-his-face sails over our head with his Wyvern and I hear the sound of flapping wings, followed by a wet-sounding crunch. Let's…not worry about him now.

Especially since he actually had a few Wvyern Riders coming straight at us.

"Ash! Stop moving!" Maribelle demanded with her staff in hand, since I was turning to aim.

I obediently stop.

…

_Insert accurate description of the physical pain of having a spear roughly pulled out of your body here._

…

Yes, yes. That.

"Uh…ow?" I say weakly, looking at the bloody spear lying on the ground and Lissa and Maribelle patching me up with their staves.

"Yes, yes, you're a big boy." Maribelle said impatiently, getting a giggle from Lissa.

"Uh…are you ok, Ash?" Ricken asks weakly.

"Do I look pale to you?" I'm slurring a little.

"A bit." Ricken…if Ricken is as pale as me I must've lost a lot of blood.

Look down…yeah. Maribelle's dress is now a nice shade of red.

"Ok, you're fine now." Maribelle sighed, slumping onto the ground.

I look up because I just remembered there were Wyverns.

"Don't worry about them; the Pegasus Knights are fighting them." Lon'qu said, leading a small group of men to us. "They're Chon'sin mercenaries." He waved to them with his sword.

He then looks at us "I see that the rescue operation went smoothly."

"Yeah, I think. We'll still need to have these two checked out by a doctor at first opportunity though." I say.

"They didn't do anything. Maribelle made sure of that." Lissa said quickly.

"Damn straight, like hell am I letting…uh." Maribelle stopped when she saw us (me excluded) look at her funny. "W-well, we still have a battle to focus on, let's not get sidetracked!"

"I agree." I pull out a pair of legs for my rifle, and set it on the ground. "Is there anything that can attack me from behind?"

"As far as I know all Plegian troops are trying to kill the Prince and the Exalt." Lon'qu said. "What are you doing?"

I turn and see him stare at me. For the record, I'm lying flat on the ground about to snipe through my gun. "Cheating." I say after a moment. "Wait." I unclip all of my nails and set them within easy reach. "Now I'm cheating."

"I feel sorry for the Plegians." Lissa mumbled, earning a look from Ricken. "I mean…Ylisse wasn't safe from bandits and thieves just because she was a nice person."

That's…that's actually a very valid point. Just because Plegia couldn't attack during the ten years doesn't mean bandits couldn't attack, and if Ylisse has lost no territory to bandits…

Then I might need to reassess exactly how powerful Emmeryn is.

But first, time to cheat.

…

…

…

[More 3rd person camera]

…

…

When the Plegian army charged down the hill, Robin took immediate action.

"Everyone fall back. Long range units start firing."

Virion and Miriel unloaded a barrage of arrows and fire upon this command, devastating the Plegian front line (of a couple of people).

"There's about sixty of them." Robin murmured. "Fredrick, Sully, Stahl, prepare to charge."

"At once!" Fredrick readied his spear, staring down the Plegian mass of troops.

Robin counted silently to herself, and then…

"Go!"

The two Cavaliers charged in a slanted line through the Plegians, following the path cut out by Fredrick as he and his lance dove through the Plegian troops.

"Chrom!"

With a roar, Chrom, Vaike, and Donnel fell upon the Plegian troops temporarily cut off from their brethren, and quickly cut them down before falling back again; the ones that were left standing were blasted down by Miriel and Robin.

"Woo! Easy as cake." Vaike said, sticking his tongue out as a taunt.

"They're going to be more organized this time." Robin warned, drawing her own sword. "Front line, fall back and brace for enemy charge, use the trees as cover." She gets a few acknowledgements in response, and then fires up a puff of fire in response.

Sumia, flying high above the sky, dove down into the battlefield.

An archer saw her and drew his bow, but since she had tossed a javelin at his face first she won the initiative and Plegia was short an archer.

"Search and destroy enemy archers, she says." Sumia grumbles, flying high up again in case an archer she doesn't see try to shoot her down.

…

For the next few minutes in the battle, Robin continued to shout orders while fighting, orchestrating a series of defenses where the Shepherds constantly maintained a tight formation and forced the Plegians to break themselves on the airtight defense, complete with the occasional surprise as one of them slam into Kellam by accident and get stabbed for their troubles.

However, Plegia still outnumbered Ylisse, and the captains, sensing the situation change, quickly ordered their men to fight defensively, retreating when tired and rotating in fresh troops to harass and batter down the Shepherds, hoping to turn the battle into one of attrition, especially as the Shepherds retreated to the burned down house and started using it to shelter the wounded units from the Plegian's sporadic arrow fire.

…

Well, they would've turned it into a stalemate if not for the sudden cries of pain from within the middle of their ranks.

…

"Damn, not enough penetration power." Ash muttered from his sniping position, as everyone around him alternated between looking at him in confusion and looking down on the battlefield in fear and anger.

…

"What's going on?!" Robin demanded.

Virion hopped on Sully's horse with a deft move and narrowed his eyes, watching…as the back line of the Plegian troops suddenly shuddered as if something impacted the lines.

"The Plegians are being hit! I don't know by what!" Virion yelled as he used his new perch to fire arrows into the Plegian crowd, much to Sully's dismay.

_Must be Ash. _Robin thought, running her sword through the chest of a Plegian soldier.

"Robin, you're too far forward." Chrom warned as his Falchion swing blew three Plegian soldiers back with its sheer force.

Vaike, not to be outdone, swung upwards with his axe (not unlike a golfer) and tossed a Plegian into the sky.

Robin found herself roughly manhandled by a Plegian who charged into her. She stumbled back, rolled, and crouched back on her feet.

Unfortunately, her sword was lost in the Plegian corpse she made.

The Plegian soldier lunges forward with his spear.

Robin darts to the side and immediately rams into the (comparatively beefier) soldier, to little effect.

The soldier grins, then his eyes widen in mild surprise when Robin grabs his throat.

And then convulses uncontrollably as Robin runs her thunder spell through his body.

Robin drops the smoking corpse to the ground and then looks around. "Cavalry, begin strike!" She shouts and takes the now dead soldier's spear for herself.

Fredrick waves to Sully and Stahl, and the three forms into their mini-wedge formation again.

…

[Back to 1st person camera]

…

This is stupid. I'm literally out of ammo. I packed twice the ammo I thought I would ever need and I actually ran out ON CHAPTER FIVE.

_Maybe you should shoot slower._

And the rails of the gun are smoking.

I didn't think spirit dust could actually overheat, but apparently I was wrong about that.

_It's not like you're actually generating heat._

I'm using magic. Literally anything can happen because of magic.

Also, Robin is a badass for perfecting that move of hers.

"How's the battle going?" Lon'qu asks, crouching down next to me.

"Robin's got Fredrick doing mop up." I say as I sight a Plegian healer, wishing that I had ammo to shoot with.

_Emmeryn had explicitly forbidden the killing of noncombatants._

Oh yeah.

"Did you actually help?" Lissa asked, looking at the smoke rising from the four "rails" of the gun.

"I think so." The back lines of the enemy ranks seem to be more disorganized, in any case. "This thing isn't very useful at the range I want it to be. Shame, really."

"This is the first time I've ever seen you use this thing, I think." Ricken said, squinting down at the battlefield.

"Yeah, yeah. No more Wyverns?" I see the enemy lines starting to buckle.

"None that we can see; they're probably still tangling with the Pegasus knights." Ricken said, scanning the sky.

"Overall, the rescue mission is a success." Ricken laughed. "I didn't think it would go this smoothly!"

"We got Emmeryn to thank for that." I mutter. "Seriously though, I didn't think she would be this…eager? To get into a scuffle."

I look down again. I think the giant ball of light in the middle of the Shepherds is Emmeryn, which means that although she declared her intention to fight she hasn't actually hit anyone.

_Buff supporters are powerful though._

True. Imagine if she had Rally Spectrum and Rally Heart on stage five. Total Gamebreaker Status achieved.

"Well, I'm not gonna achieve anything by staying here." I oh WOW the barrels are hot. I'm not slinging them on my back any time soon.

"So…" Lon'qu signals for the mercenaries to rally; they've just been kind of watching the crowd down there tremble every time I pulled the trigger.

"Yeah, we're heading down there." I sigh. I don't have free hands since the rifle head is too hot to wear, and I don't want a source of potential fire near my head.

"Ok. We're going first then." Lon'qu said, his men heading toward the gentler part of the cliffs to go down.

"Ricken, girls, go with them." I add unnecessarily.

"What are you planning to do now?" Maribelle asks wearily.

"LEEROY—" I charge toward the cliff and brace my rifle on my shoulder so I can have a free hand.

"What the hell?!" Ricken stares as I jump off.

"JEEEEENKINS!" Old joke, still good. Activate spell circles in my shoes, and pull out my spell notebook with my other hand.

_Spell notebook: the little book of spells every mage carries that contains their favorite spells. Ricken's is like a few pages thick, Miriel's would pass for an Encyclopedia."_

…

…

[Everyone]

The Plegians and Shepherds were momentarily distracted as a bird made of flames appeared out of nowhere and descended towards the battlefield with a shriek.

…

…

[Ash's mind]

This is simultaneously the coolest and dumbest thing I've ever had the balls to do in my life.

…

…

[Robin]

"Now!" She shouted, getting the attention of the Shepherds and driving into the distracted Plegian line with awesome force, scattering them entirely.

…

…

[Ash's mind]

Oh shit, she just took away my landing.

…

…

[Everyone]

The battlefield watched as the bird of fire made its landing… and then promptly sputter and roll and in general act as if the bird had crash landed into the ground.

…

…

[Back to first person camera]

…

O…kay. That was…the most horrible landing I think I've ever accomplished.

_You didn't technically land._

I see Robin walk over to me, a smile playing on her lips.

"Nice trick." I hear her giggle. "Do you need a hand?"

I currently lack the ability to speak due to the wind being knocked out of my lungs forever, so I make some nonsensical hand gestures.

"No?" She cocks her head. I nod. "Ok then." She looks around. "Thanks to your little play the Plegian morale broke entirely. Did you know they would do that?" I shake my head. "I see…thanks!" She laughs openly. "Next time, let me know before you pull a trick like that, ok?" I nod.

Ok, breathing now. Sweet, sweet air.

Robin keeps on laughing as she walks away and leaves me lying on the ground.

…

…

…

"I still don't know if that was incredibly brave or incredibly stupid of you." Maribelle deadpans.

"It worked, didn't it? It's all good." I shrug.

We're on the return trip to Ylisstol. A fast return trip, since for all intents and purposes Plegia just declared war.

She rolls her eyes. "Keep that up and you'll die long before you get anything done."

"By the way, what did you yell as you…well, y'know." Ricken asked.

"The name of a famous warrior from my world." I say as solemnly as possible. "His name is a reminder for us to charge forward without fear." I think I deserve a reward for saying that line without cracking a smile.

"It was a charge without something, all right." Robin said lightly.

Fake lightly; while the Shepherds came out of the battle relatively unharmed due to her strategies and Emmeryn's buffs, the Pegasus Knights weren't nearly as lucky.

I think we lost about half of the force that was sent, around…eleven girls.

_Not men?_

They're not men, it feels weird to say "eleven women", and "eleven units" sound a bit heartless.

_What about your favorite Pegasus Knight? The one who you still don't the name of?_

She seems to be fine; when I asked about her the rest of the knights giggled and gave me no straight answer, so I think that's a good sign.

In any case…

"What about the Pegasi?" I ask.

"They're trained to fly back to the stables if they lose their riders." Robin answers quickly.

…Well, at least we won't have to worry about that.

…

Now then, how about that guilt trip?

Number one: I feel zero guilt about killing the asshat guards.

Number two: I feel some level of guilt about killing the asshat guards in such a way that litters their innards across the landscape.

Number two and half: I feel a moderate amount of guilt after hearing some of them cry for their parents before they bled out.

Number three: I feel a severe amount of guilt from letting Lissa and Maribelle see the amount of savagery my weapon can cause.

Hmm.

…

"Ash."

Wha?

"Ash!"

"What?" I look around.

"About time." Robin sighed. "We're taking a break."

Oh. Okay. "Right." I hop off the cart.

Let's see…check rifle. Rails are now cooled, but I should probably maintain them just in case.

I'm amazed they weren't damaged when I birded myself into the ground.

…

"You okay over there?" Robin frowned. "You seem to be…a little more unfocused than normal."

Implying I was ever focused to begin with. "I'm alright. I got to see firsthand what I can do at close combat range." Let's see here…I really should've made this to be easily detachable.

"Uh…" Robin stares at me as I try to unplug a piece of steel from my rifle with all of my strength. "Want some help?" She asks after I fail.

"Nah." PULL! HARDER! C'MON!

_It comes loose and we lose our balance for a moment._

It's a little hard since I have to make sure nothing spills out when I pull the rods loose.

Ok, whew. Now for the rest of them.

"I take it you were responsible for confusing the Plegians before your…bird incident." Robin continued to maintain a safe distance from me as I remove the other rails.

"Yeah, more or less." Let's see…the rail weight hasn't changed all that much, so the spirit powder wasn't burned away…but the casting paper is gone.

Well…shit, I guess? I didn't know that could happen.

_Normal spell books have durability, why are we surprised by this?_

Uh…hm. Nevermind then.

"Something wrong?" I guess it's written on my face?

"Nah, I just need to do a little more work when I get back." I pull out some spare paper (that all mages carry) and tie the end of the rails.

"I noticed that Lissa and Maribelle went out of their way to avoid looking at you. Did something happen?" Robin asked suddenly.

Did… "War happened. Does that count?"

"Hmm…because when I asked them about your daring rescue they would just avoid the question, so it made me wonder." Robin taps the binding on her spell book and doesn't look at me.

Something is being assumed here.

"This guy." I tap the base of my rifle. "Is powerful enough to blow a human body to pieces at close range, and my rescue of the two healers ended with a pool of dead Plegian kids because their captain was an asshole. Does that answer your question?"

Robin blinks in surprise.

_You were a little too angry there._

Deep breaths, deep breaths.

"In other words…you think they're being unfair to you?" Robin said slowly.

…

"No, no." I shake my head. "It's just…Ugh. I can't read their minds. Point being, I turned twenty men into mincemeat without batting an eyelash. That probably got to them."

"Ah." Robin shifts uncomfortably.

"Oy! You two!" Vaike calls from…wherever he is. "Lunchtime!"

"We'll discuss this later." Robin mumbles.

…

In the end we didn't discuss this later.

I guess she had a talk with Maribelle and Lissa and figured something out.

_Either way, we're well on our way of being alienated from the Shepherds._

Yay?

_So how many support ranks do you think you have at this point?_

Uh…is it possible to negatively advance in ranks? Because I'm pretty sure I lost some thanks to this chapter.

…

We're on the road again, two days later.

Two days of…hell, I don't even know, quiet on the road, I guess. We all have a lot to think about and a lot of resting to do.

Pretty sure I heard Lissa wake up one night and sob as quietly as she could.

Man, I feel like an ass.

"Sir Ash." Emmeryn said, looking right at me.

"Just Ash is fine; what's up?" _Again with the slang._

Force of habit.

"What do you feel about Lissa?"

…

…

O…kay. What?

_That one sentence just attracted the attention of every Shepherd. Also, Maribelle has her hand on her parasol just in case you have a bad answer._

What the hell qualifies as a bad answer?!

"What…I'm not sure what you mean, your highness. Uh…" I am terrified at this point. Being at the center of attention isn't good for my heart.

She smiles a little sadly. "I heard that you had overreacted to protect lady Maribelle and my dear Lissa, so it makes me curious." Her smile turns just a tad mischievous.

_Remember she's still twenty four, all things considered._

Also, "overreacted" is putting it very, very mildly. Like… "The ocean is a little deep" mildly.

"Well, uh…" I'm still busy trying to piece my thoughts together.

"Yes, Ash, tell us how you feel about my dear Lissa." Maribelle…I'm not going to live through the night, I can just tell.

ROBIN. ROBIN. I SEE YOU SMIRKING.

Also I see Chrom idly palming the Falchion hilt.

"Uh…she is…"

Y'know what, fuck it.

"I feel responsible for landing her in this mess."

"Yes, yes. So how do you feel about her?" Robin's eyes are positively _sparkling_.

_Can I just mention the fact that Lissa has her back turned steadfastly towards you?_

"She is…a friend." And Maribelle takes out her parasol. "What, were you expecting a confession?" She stops for a second and finishes taking out her parasol.

"Aww, so there's no love for our little princess?" Robin grins.

"I _like _her, but not, uh, romantically. Why the hell are we talking about this?!" Defense, defense, defense!

"Well…" Robin leans over to peek at Lissa, who has now buried her face in her hands.

_Y'know…we JUST had an instance of killing a shitton of people._

So maybe they're just trying to unwind…yeah, I get the picture.

I wonder how many kills the Shepherds had before the game started, though…

"I claim age difference." I say, raising my hands up. "And I think Lon'qu is a better fit than me."

Lon'qu, I apologize for throwing you under the bus.

"I feel the same about her as you do. Her energy as a princess is certainly attractive." Lon'qu said tersely.

Oh really.

"Got someone in mind already?" I ask lightly.

Lon'qu just rolls his eyes.

"So if you could court Lissa, would you?" Maribelle asks (almost compulsively, I might add).

"Uh…I claim age difference. I would otherwise, I think." Can I stop getting interrogated now?

_COVER. COVER._

What oh shit right uh…how do I women? "For the record I would date Maribelle too under similar 'what if' conditions."

That…at least stopped her from shanking me with her parasol.

"Ah…you're no fun." Robin sighed.

Uh-huh. "So who has their eyes on Robin?" I ask to the crowd at large.

"Don't you dare." Robin says sweetly with electricity crackling around her hand.

"Ash, how old are ya?" Donnel asks.

I'm…uh. Calculating…

"I'm 24 in my world." Probably. It's hard to tell how age works when you move to different universes. "So I'm probably 24 here, too."

Miriel's eyebrows shoot up. "Fascinating...do you believe that time flows differently in different planes of existences?"

Uh...

"Yeah, kind of. There're…many theories concerning how time flows when we go to different places." I really shouldn't try to change my explanation half way through my sentence.

"Sounds like your civilization is quite advanced." Miriel says, peering at me over her glasses.

"We had the fortune of not experiencing any cataclysmic events." I shrug. "Doesn't make us better."

Oh god I attracted Miriel's attention.

"Fascinating." I'm…uh…creeped out. I'm really creeped out.

"For the record what I know doesn't even count as a tiny fragment of our world's knowledge." I'm not helping things much, since she has actually slid up to-MIRABELLE. YOUR GRIN is terrifying. "And most of what I know is theory and not practice."

"Excellent."

…Welp.

_This would be an "out of frying pan and into the fire" moment…if this was Emmeryn's attempt to stop the Shepherds from breaking at the seams I say it went pretty well._

Can…can I have the frosty polite silence now? Please?

.

.

.

{ === + === }

So Chapter five came and went.

Hmm...


	10. From - Nowhere Near Miriel

Hoo boy.

Throughout the trip I went over…uh, just about every concept I knew with Miriel.

Which isn't saying much since I could explain very little.

It didn't stop her from trying to pry every last piece from my head.

…

Robin actually instituted a 24 hour guard over my tent because Miriel kept trying to sneak in.

It would be suggestive if she didn't have glasses that _shone in the dark._

I mean, imagine waking up and there's just a pair of shiny-ass glasses floating over your head accompanied by cackling.

I didn't sleep well this week and I now have an ingrained fear of Miriel.

…

Her drive for knowledge scares me.

…

"I understand full well that you have only concepts to share." Miriel had said yesterday when I asked why she didn't seem to care about the specifics of the concepts. "I believe that the odds of different realms having similar parameters for existence are extremely small, thus, I don't believe the specifics as pertaining to your place of origin would be very useful for us here."

Which is…a pretty reasonable assumption, all things considered.

I wonder what the parameters for this world are.

Gravity is obviously close enough otherwise I'd be superhuman or totally useless at this point.

Hmm…

I wish I paid more attention to high school physics. Oh well. I'll have plenty of time to test it after we stop travelling.

…

Well, when I get resituated in my quarters and I can start writing things down without it raining on my notes, because we have stopped travelling; at Robin's suggestion we double-timed it back to the fortress, since she was worried about Emmeryn being targeted while on the road.

Which is…nice, but a bit unnecessary, since by the time Robin suggested we were close enough to Ylisstol already to see the walls in the distance.

Either way.

We arrived at the castle with…maybe three, four hours until nightfall.

…

The one downside with rushing back to the castle is…the Risen that occupy the road. We ended up having to fight a handful of times against some fresh Risen on the road (which worries me a little, since the Risen we met far from Ylisstol were on the verge of breaking down).

On the plus side I got a lot of practice with my wind shoes, dashing in to stab something before dashing out again. I miss having my rifle operational so I could snipe from the cart, like Virion.

_You didn't even bother picking up more nails from the villages you passed by._

That's because we passed by them. I can't just go "Hey guys can you wait for fifteen minutes? I need to get four boxes of nails."

Speaking of villages, most of them seem to be pretty aware that Plegia has declared war, although there doesn't seem to be a lot of willingness to actually grab a weapon and fight.

_Just because they're aware of it…_

Doesn't mean they're willing to do anything about it, yeah. Especially since Emmeryn hasn't given the orders to raise an army. I'm pretty sure she won't actually raise an army.

Ugh…

I'm too tired.

Brain isn't working.

…

"Hey, Ash. Where are you going?" I hear Robin call behind me as I head into the castle.

"Bed."

"You don't want any dinner?" Lissa sounds surprised.

"I'll make it up tomorrow." Fuck it, sleep comes first, even though I'm starving.

_Sure you don't want to maintain your weapons first?_

I can't make the spell circles work when I'm this tired.

…

Bed! Glorious…glorious…

"Who are you?" I ask the lady messing with my bed.

She jumps, turns, and bows.

"Oh, you're a new maid?" She's dressed like one. I didn't notice when I just got in.

She nods.

She also has really pretty light pink-ish hair.

"Fine, fine…leave. I need my sleep." I can't stop yawning and the climb up to this place isn't making it any better.

She bows again and leaves in a hurry.

_A little rude, aren't we?_

…

…

…

Wow, what a hell of a dream…since when did carts transform into Gundams?

_You were humming the OP to Build Fighters during the trip. That might be why._

Yeah, and in the end every decided to suddenly break down every table in existence with a stupidly insistent and loud knocking.

The incessant knocking that was…is…still going on…

_Uh oh._

Oh shit, don't tell me.

Get up, open the door.

It's the maid from before. I think. It's hard to tell due to lack of adequate lighting. She's giving out the same "cute" aura as before, or maybe I'm just still disoriented…

_You are._

She also seems to be trying to say something.

"Is the castle under attack?" I ask her. She looks up in surprise and nods furiously.

_Is she mute?_

"When did this attack start?" I ask her. Oh wait, that's an open ended question.

"If…if it pleases your—" Oh hell, is that why? She can't remember formality? This is stupid.

"Drop the polite speak. What's going on?" I'm scrambling to put on my very battered leather armor. I need some new ones pretty soon.

"Uh, uh…" Oh for the love of-

I grab her by the shoulders.

"People are dying. What's. Going. On."

"Assassins are in the castle." She says very quickly…and she has a very pretty voice. I also don't think she's used to having people get within her personal bubble.

"How many?"

"I don't know, uh, sir."

"Shit. How long ago was this?"

"Not…not very. I came here as fast as I could." Why did she come only for me?

_Focus._

"Damn. Alright, go wake the other Shepherds." Quick equipment check: Sword? Check. Hidden Arm gun, check. Twin daggers, check. Wind shoes, check…magical gloves, check. Ok, let's do this.

"What about you?" She asks, looking around the corridor fearfully.

"What do you think?!" I snarl.

…

I knew an assassination was coming. I told Robin to post extra guards on Emmeryn once we got back.

I thought they would at least wait for a day or so before starting chapter six.

Brillant fuckers…and here I hoped I could get a clean shot at the Skinny Dark Elf Guy without the massive confusion of an ambush.

_Why didn't they hit us on the road? There were plenty of opportunities._

Turn right, head down the stairs, head toward the door…I hear the sounds of combat.

Or, rather, the sound of people dying.

…

The front courtyard is illuminated by torches, and the guards are…being summarily massacred by the assassins.

I've sparred with some of the guards before. They're at least as good in a melee as I am.

That doesn't bode well for me.

Well, no time to worry.

_Eyes reporting in: some cloaked figured have rushed past the melee and are vanishing into the walls left and right._

Focus spell power on the wind shoes…pick my target…and…

"FALCON!" _Wind powered charge…_

"STAB!" _Right in the…_

Ooh, right in the throat.

The unfortunate assassin falls dead with a gurgle, and I stopped the melee for a brief moment with my nonsensical yell.

A chill. Assassin at my back.

_For the record these are men dressed in assassin garb, so the shoulder knife things, hoods, the whole nine yards._

Raise sword.

He stabs.

Crap, dodge left and spin, slash!

Miss. He jumped over it.

_Overhead kick warning._

That jump height is terrifying.

Duck, listen to the leg fly over my head.

Dash forward, sword up.

Got your foot! Push!

The man lands in a heap.

Ok, turn, invert sword, gut stab to finish.

Look around…yeah, the sudden death of one of their own from the neck stab gave us a temporary advantage.

Temporary because oh holy shit that guy is fast and coming right at me

Raise sword to defend.

He knocks it clean out of my hand and now I'm off balance…that upper body strength is insane.

_Your sword is lost in the darkness, given by how it flew in a direction away from the castle._

Shit he's still coming.

_Draw daggers._

Drawing!

Better idea, wind shoes dodge backwards!

…

Ha ha!

Can't catch me when I'm fifteen feet away all of a sudden, can you?!

_Getting a little cocky._

Wind shoes charge!

…

Well, shit. I whiffed.

_Told ya._

Man is now to my right.

Turn with dagger stab!

He blocks my arm with a grab and brings his sword to my throat.

Use other dagger to defend.

_So to recap: his sword is separate from our throat because the left hand dagger is being held at a truly awkward angle to catch said sword on the hilt, while our right hand dagger is nowhere near his neck because he has better arm strength._

That's…that's about it, yeah.

"Weak. Truly weak. Is this the best Ylisse can do?" The man smirks.

I can't use my arm gun from this position.

Hell, wind shoes again, with the knee to your gut!

He blocks with his thigh, and whoa I'm now on the ground.

"You're certain a cut above the average guard." The man sneers, and does some kind of hand signal.

_Shoot him now?_

No point. Moving my arm means he sees it and probably will dodge it.

Wind shoes again and kick my legs into his face!

Oh, I actually connected.

_You're upside down in a handstand (kind of) with your foot right in the man's cheek._

Draw my legs in into crouch, and…spring right into his face!

Man is now unsteady.

Legs back, reorient…I look like I'm on the starting line of a race, position-wise.

Once more! Wind shoes!

I hear him grunt as I run straight into his torso at whatever speed I was going with my leather-reinforced elbow.

Unforunately I don't have my daggers anymore. Must've dropped them when he threw me to the ground…fine.

Activate fire gloves.

"Damn you!" The man pulls his sword out to stab. Must be getting a bit desperate.

Side step, grab sword arm. Punch elbow in the direction it's not meant to bend in.

…yep, that sounded like it broke something.

Grab his sword, turn, and…slash!

He's now bleeding profusely from his throat, and retreating insanely fast, holy shit.

"I'll remember this." He snarls, fading into the shadow.

…

_We've read enough Tvtropes to know what would happen if we let him go, right?_

Like hell am I gonna let this bite me in the ass.

Wind shoes pursue!

He's on the…how did he get on the wall? There's like nothing for his hands to hold onto.

Whatever, wind shoes jump!

"What the…?!" Last words I hear coming from him as he turns to see me with fire on my hands and green on my feet flying at his face.

…

…

Shit, I got two, but…the entire courtyard of twenty or so soldiers are dead.

Correction, they were dead by the time the second guy tossed me to the ground. It took…what, the assassins upward of twenty seconds to slaughter the entire courtyard and keep going.

Obviously I'm not their target or I would've been dead already.

_It's not balanced for the player to win this time._

Double shit. I need to get back to Emmeryn right now.

…

The castle sounds like it's finally waking up. I can hear a lot of noises, but they're too indistinct for me to make out exactly what's going on…just a lot of shouting.

…Well.

…Lying on the side of the corridor is a dead maid.

It looks like the assassins at least slit her throat simply.

Are they not discriminating anymore? We're all kinds of fucked if that's the case.

Damn. Sorry, servant folk, but Emmeryn is more important.

God does that sentence leave a bad taste in my mouth.

…

…

Turn around the corner here and…torches.

Ylissean soldiers, plus one Ylissean noble.

"There he is! Get him!" Uh.

That can't be good for me.

"Hold it! I'm a Shepherd." I say while skidding to a stop.

"Like I'll believe that, assassin." The captain of the men sneered. "Kill him!"

Well, shit.

Time for more jet boots! Run forward…

And…

Now!

_The men can only watch as you sail clear over their head with a single jump and land on the other side._

And I think I botched the landing. Ow ow ow ow.

Continue jet booting away, from the well-intentioned but misguided noble who's trying to protect the castle.

_If he's misguided and trying to kill everyone he sees…_

Then there's a chance that the castle's own guards are split in factions, yeah.

It's just one issue after another, isn't it?

Pass the next corner, almost hit the wall, and…

Bodies. Soldier body parts. Severed gauntlets, helmets, broken spears.

Looks like they were cut to pieces, but…not a lot of blood. It looks more like a pile of wax body parts than, y'know, actual body parts in this dim lighting.

_And yet the only thing we feel is relief that there isn't blood on the ground._

I'm an asshole, let's move on.

…

"Ash!" Stahl bursts through a corridor with some guards.

"Stahl! Are you ok?" I skid to a stop.

"I'm alright." Stahl says. He seems to be in pain. "Where are you headed to?"

"Emmeryn. They have to be targeting her." I don't actually know why beyond prior knowledge.

_Well, we have an idea._

Yeah, yeah. Emmeryn dies, Ylisse crumbles at the seams because Chrom's not very respected as an actual leader, so on, so forth. 100 percent all natural speculation and conspiracy theories.

"We'll go with you." Stahl says with a nod.

"Right. Do you have extra torches?"

…

Ah, precious, precious light.

The men were told to light every scone they saw and illuminate the whole castle while Stahl and I went ahead.

Considering that we effectively told them to "stay safe" while we run headlong into guys that can kill all of us the soldiers didn't seem to mind our orders one bit.

"Ash, why do you think they're after the Exalt?" Stahl asks while we run.

"I can't imagine them hitting anyone else." Nobody else in the Shepherds is important enough to assassinate, Chrom can handle himself, and if they wanted to kill Lissa they would've done it already.

"No, I mean…why do you think they want her life?"

Uh…

"I can't imagine. If she dies Ylisse goes nuts and burn Plegia to the ground. It doesn't make sense." I don't want to mislead Stahl but I don't need to worry about political bullshit in the middle of an assassination.

"I see." Stahl readies his sword as we clear the last set of stairs to Emmeryn's room.

I see…the door to the room open, and light flickering from within…no torchlight on the outside, either. So either no guards made it here or…

_The assassins outpaced all of you._

Let's…not think about that possibility.

"Cover me." I mutter and ready my sword. I don't hear anything from inside the room…I don't think she'll be dead at this point, but by god do I not want to do this.

…

_You're going to have to bite the bullet here._

Dammit.

Ok…

One…two…

Three!

I charge into the slightly open door and blow it wide open, and come…

Very, very close to impaling myself on Falchion.

Er…

"Hi, Marth." I sigh because FUCK YEAH she made it here first.

"Hello, Ash." LucinaMARTH pulls her Falchion away from my face. I see Emmeryn sitting serenely next to the bed behind her, dressed…

I should probably stop looking, although to be fair it's nothing flamboyant.

_Pity it doesn't have the laces you like so much._

Oh god dammit now I want to double check.

"Ah, Ash. Thank you for coming." Emmeryn says calmly and once again I feel the surge of power.

"Whoa." I hear Stahl mutter behind me.

"I'm glad to see you safe, Exalt." I bow to Emmeryn and turn to Marth. "Are you the first one here?"

"Panne got here before you did." Marth said quickly, "But she went to assist in the castle halls."

I nod. "Right. Keep doing what you're doing, then."

"Like I need you to tell me that." Marth says, and then suddenly throws her Falchion to the corner of the room.

An assassin drops to the ground and pulls out his sword, but not before Marth ran up and punches him in the face...

And then knees him in the stomach…

And finally runs him through with the Falchion.

Violent Lucina is violent.

"Don't you have a castle to patrol?" She says lightly, wiping Falchion on the dead guy's cloak.

…

"When did you meet Marth?" Stahl asks. "And who's Panne?"

"We met during the arena match in Ferox." The worst part about not having a map camera is not knowing where anyone is. As far as my eyes and feet can tell the map we're dealing with is nothing like the chapter six map, and that worries me.

If only because I'm worried about someone besides Emmeryn dying.

"Stahl, can you wait here with" I almost called her Lucina "Marth?"

"Uh…I don't think it's a good idea to go off on your own." Stahl says hesitantly.

He's right, but I'm trying to be in two places at once.

"I know, but…Emmeryn's more important. Besides," I wiggle my foot. "I can run from a fight, you can't."

Stahl frowns, but nods.

"Thanks." I activate my wind boots and head down the…

_Mental coin flip. Heads._

Right side.

…

Christ, the path is practically lined with dead guards and nobles.

All pushed to the sides of the hallways, leaving the main path bloody but otherwise clear.

Hmm…

…

Looks like this is the path to the throne room…if the blood flowing out of the room is any indication. I kind of wish it wasn't so brightly lit.

Welp. Here goes nothing.

…

_Procrastination won't make someone less dead._

…

Now!

…

O…kay, that is a lot of corpses. A lot of servant corpses, some assassin corpses, and a few soldier corpses, and…

_You feel a savage happiness seeing the dead assassins on the ground, even if it's only a handful of them._

We feel a savage happiness. Standing in the center of the throne room is…

A tall, dark, problematically thin dude staring at the burning throne with no small amounts of glee.

"Ah…a new visitor. Welcome, how do you like the…decorations I've brought to this dusty old place?" His voice is a bit deeper than it is in the game. I'm not sure why that of all things caught my attention.

"Yo, Validar."

"I see my exploits have reached even your ears, servant." Validar grins. "Do you have any idea how difficult it was to break into this room? Very hard, you know. So many bodies, so little…time." He squishes a ball of magical power in his hands for emphasis.

"I can only imagine. You do know court isn't in session at this hour, right?" I can feel sweat going down my back. This is _bad_. I hoped to snipe him from a really fucking far away, not at melee range.

"Ha! Of course…but I do enjoy doing things right." He pacing in front of the burning chair, casually kicking away the corpses on the ground with every step, and that grin doesn't fall from his face all the while.

"Then perhaps you can come back in the morning?" I growl. Have to keep him talking, have to buy time.

_For what?_

"Oh, I will, after I bring in a new throne." Validar idly thumbs through his spell book. "Can't let a man of my stature stand throughout the day, now can I?"

"I don't think your twig-like legs could stand under your weight." I mutter. I think that counts as a thin joke and a fat joke in one sentence.

_Are thin jokes even a thing?_

"I keep myself fit on a diet of Ylisseans and idiots, and you sound absolutely _delectable._" He rubs his fingers together. Would that count as emphasis?

Also that is the most homoerotic thing I've heard so far. "If you ate yourself you would have infinite energy."

He openly laughs. "I like you, boy! The first man to have met me and decided to talk instead of..." He waves his hand, as if to conjure up the right words. "…_trying_ to kill me. It's certainly a very refreshing feeling! Now then, let me see if your death screams are as interesting as your words." Validar shows a ball of dark energy on his hand.

Too bad for you I have initiative.

…

[3rd person camera]

…

Validar then twitched in shock as Ash suddenly streaked forward to plunge a sword into his body.

"No mere servant, I see." Validar snarls as Ash bounces back from some unforeseen force.

_Shit, is that a barrier? _Ash wonders, and then goes "eep!" as a Flux spell grabs for him.

…

[1st person camera]

…

Shit shit shit shit I'm weak to dark fuck fuck fuck

_Pay no attention to all the body parts and blood your wind shoes are blowing around the room._

I CAN'T HEAR YOU OVER THE SOUND OF FLUX SHREDDING THE ROOM APART

…

[3rd person camera]

…

"Run! Run! Little mouse!" Validar laughs as he fires Flux after Flux after Ash as he dashes around the room with the help of his wind shoes.

"Fuck you too, Validar!" Ash roars, and raises his left arm.

Validar feels some force impact his chest, and looks down to see two nails pinning his cloak to his body. "What trickery is this!?"

Ash then redirects himself and jump towards Validar, and then he swings down with all his might.

"Bah!" Validar blows him away with a burst of raw magical power. "Petty tricks. The Grimleal can do better, child." He then gathers an immense amount of magic onto his hands.

Ash, in response, unclips one holster of nails. "Yeah?" With practiced speed, he loads the hidden arm gun without faltering in his aim of Validar, and fires.

Validar's gathered magical power falters as he feels nails impact his body.

"How are you getting past my barrier, you mongrel?!" Validar snarls, discharging his dark magic in a blast around him.

_Oh shit. _Ash thought as he fired a second barrage of nails at Validar.

…

[1st person camera]

…

Ok…that wave…didn't hurt at all.

Not in the sense that I can't feel it. I can feel that magical power permeating through my entire body…it just doesn't feel like it hurt.

"Is that it, Validar?" I can't help but be just a tad snarky as I shoot him again.

"Stop that!" Validar snarls. I think I'm irritating him.

_It doesn't bode well if our skull-piercing weapon can only annoy the early game version of the boss._

He gathers more dark magic in his hands.

I'm worried that he just set me up to be a bomb, so…grab one of the spears from the dead guards.

Wind boots, charge!

…

He sidesteps me with a sneer.

…

And I can't stop because wind boots have like zero friction.

So…

Hello, wall.

"How heroic." Validar is so sarcastic he almost looped back around to sincere. "My turn!"

_Dodge it!_

Like hell I can, I can't even see straight!

"Ash!" I hear a girl's yell behind me, and then an explosion.

"Bah, more nuisances." Validar grumbles, and I get my bearing enough to turn and see…Nino. Hi Nino.

"Are you ok?" Nino asks, not taking her eyes off of the tall skinny evil guy.

_That makes him sound utterly ridiculous._

"Yeah." I sound just a bit dizzy.

"How nice, to have a lady of the castle" my god is his voice is dripping with contempt "protect you and only you." If contempt was actually a liquid this castle would be flooded. Sheesh.

Nino just shoots fire spells into Validar, forcing him to block with this…weird slimy looking shield thing. Can dark magic actually do that?

Either way, it blows Nino's fireballs around into the walls around the room, and one right at my head. Ow.

That is not how a shield works. That better not be how a shield works.

_If we're looking down at the room like a 2D map, we are at the top of the room, Validar is on the right, and Nino's at the bottom._

Nino doesn't say anything, but she stopped shooting in a big hurry.

"Big mistake." Validar fires something huge and evil-looking at Nino.

Nino dives and rolls into the room, and Validar's spell tear the throne room gate to pieces.

Ok, I'm ready again. The spear I borrowed is totally destroyed though; the shaft is in pieces and the head is embedded in the wall…no wonder I couldn't stop in time, if I was putting that much power behind the charge.

_Fire glove time?_

Fire glove time.

"Yo, skins and bones." I'm being a little hypocritical with this comment, but it catches Validar's attention anyways.

Long enough for him to see me fly into his face with a fire punch.

_Remember how he dodged the previous one._

That might explain why my fist didn't connect with his smugly smirking face.

Ok, reverse wind on feet, stop dead next to him…barely loose balance…

INFINITY FIRE BARRAGE PUNCHES TO FACE YEEEEEAH

_It's more like twenty punches or so._

FINISH!

_Fine, twenty one._

Validar is staggering. I knew my punches couldn't possibly sink deep if I go that fast.

"Agh, you…you belittle the essence of a mage!" Validar snarls with blood running down his face.

Also, I have no idea what the hell that is or why he would possibly care.

"Cry me a river." I snarl back and pick up a sword drenched in blood on the ground.

Validar opens his mouth but immediately shuts it as Nino drops some thunder on his head, forcing him to defend.

Which gives me an opening to…

Shit. I can't move.

"Bah…to think that I can't even execute my well laid plans. You have my attention." Validar suddenly dodges to his right and releases another burst of magic from his hand, knocking Nino back.

He then snaps his fingers.

…

[3rd person camera]

…

Ash's body suddenly behaves as if a bomb had exploded inside of it, spraying blood everywhere.

"Hm, I suppose that is unusual." Validar says, surprised, as Ash collapses to the ground.

Whatever remark he was going to make was drowned out by Nino's scream of rage as she pelted him incessantly with thunder spells.

Validar blocked the first few bolts, and then rapidly felt his shield weaken.

"Looks like you're quite the interesting specimen as well, child." Validar laughs, suddenly lunging to his right and firing a Flux at Nino.

Nino doesn't even flinch as she bats away the Flux ball with a thunder spell wrapped around her hand.

"Very, interesting, specimen." Validar licks his lips.

Nino's response is to shoot more fireballs into his face, forcing Validar to run around the room, but not before hitting Nino with the same spell he hit Ash with.

"Now then, let me see how you taste." Validar ducks beneath a wave of fireballs and snaps his fingers.

Nino felt the life drain out of her, then stumbled and fell on her rear.

"So why does it affect _him_ so badly?" Validar muses, looking at Ash's unconscious form on the ground. "Maybe he's just that sensitive to evil." He chuckles.

"I'll…I'll get you. I swear it!" Nino shouts as she struggles to get her feet underneath her; the spell felt like it drained the power from her, and her minute constitution meant she wasn't getting on her feet as fast as she wanted to.

"Oh really? I really love to see you try, my dear girl." Validar sneers, his voice once again carrying that tone of derision he had before.

"Kid! Back off!" Nino heard from behind her.

Chrom bursts into the throne room with a mighty roar, his Falchion held aloft. Robin and Fredrick follow close behind, along with an entourage of guardsmen.

"What in the hells…Ash!" Robin sees Ash's crumpled form on the ground and immediately says something to one of the guards, who salutes, turns, and runs out of the throne room.

Chrom, meanwhile, charges at the obviously evil-looking Validar, who seems to be stunned by the sudden reinforcements.

That momentary lapse of concentration caused Validar to suddenly feel the bite of the Falchion in his torso.

"Chrom!" Chrom doesn't turn to look at the sound, but pulls his sword sideways out of the body with one swift move as Robin jumps in with an overhead slash of her own, barely missing Validar's head.

"How…how dare you!" Validar snarls as he taps the end of his spell book.

Instantly, the room flashes bright.

…

Once Chrom's vision (and everyone else's) cleared up, they noticed that Validar was missing, and there was a trail of blood leading out of the throne room via one of the side exits.

"Guards! After him!" Chrom yells and charges after the blood trail, with Robin and the soldiers in tow.

"Are you alright, milady?" Fredrick asks Nino, who had finally gotten to her feet after shaking all the stars out of her eyes.

"I'm…I'm fine, look after Ash!" Nino sprints out of the room after the blood trail.

…

…

…

[1st person camera]

…

…

…

Ok…I feel like shit.

Like…wow, do I feel like shit.

Uh…what do I remember last…

AH

OK

OW

FUCK

OW

"Don't sit up so quickly, you idiot." Maribelle says.

Open my eyes…ok that burns kinda fierce.

Maribelle is sitting next to…what I'm assuming is my hospital bed, given the size of the room. I'm the only one here in this room of six beds.

Given the light source I guess it's pretty much daytime.

_Wonderful deduction._

"How long…" I sound very hoarse. I must've been out for a while.

Maribelle gives me a jug of water. Best tasting water ever.

"You were unconscious for almost two weeks now." Maribelle says as I gulp down the water.

Two weeks?!

"Seriously?" I rasp as I stop to take a breath.

"Very serious. That girl…Nino, was it? Said you were hit by some kind of dark magic attack." Maribelle scowls. "This weakness of yours is dangerous…honestly, I'm amazed you haven't died because of it yet."

I shrug.

She sighs. "Never listens to a junior, do you?"

"I don't consider you a junior." I almost impulsively say, finally having drunk enough. "Well, not by age, anyways."

"So what other factors do you consider?" Maribelle huffs.

"Uh…" change topic, fast. "What happened after I nearly died?" I'm in the hospital, it's been two weeks.

Put two and two together.

"Apparently the mysterious assailant was defeated by Chrom's entourage of guards." Maribelle takes the now empty jug.

"Did they kill him?" That's all I want to know.

Maribelle nods. "I believe so, but we didn't find the corpse."

Shit, that means he's still alive.

_We can write off plan A as a failure then._

"Wonderful. What happened during the two weeks? Where are we now?" After regaining my glasses I realized that the walls were made of wood.

"Robin decided that we needed to leave the castle for the time being, so we're currently in a village near Ylisstol." Maribelle sighed. "We've been here for the past two weeks or so. Getting you to stay alive while travelling on a wagon is difficult, you know."

"I can only imagine." I sigh. "Thanks, Maribelle."

She only 'hmphs' in response. I'm getting that response a lot, I feel. "You're almost more trouble than you're worth."

"Who is?" Robin says, stopping at the entrance to the room.

"This guy." Maribelle taps me lightly on the head.

Robin smiles in relief. "Ash, you're not dead yet." And then she growls. "You're also really expensive."

What…ok, yeah, I guess I'm eating heal charges, but…

"Ylisse has the best healers. Did I ever tell you that?" I grin, and see Maribelle blush a little.

D'aww.

"So I see." Robin's smile darkens a little. "Do you know what's going on?" She sits on the edge of my bed.

"A little. Fill me in on the details." I sit up as Maribelle leaves to do something else.

"Ok. Number one, the castle suffered catastrophic civilian losses."

…Ok, this isn't like the game, even factoring in conservation of detail.

"It seems like these assassins didn't have a target in mind." Robin continued. "According to our mysterious swordsman Marth, they made only a token effort to get near Emmeryn, who I thought was their original target."

"Same here." I mutter.

"Yeah. They killed almost everyone they can get their hands on. We got lucky since Chrom rallied us, and it backfired since he woke up the entire castle…and we didn't see you when we went to wake up you, but a maid told us you went to…do something." Robin shook her head. "Seriously though? Stop running off on your own."

"I'll keep that in mind."

"In any case, Castle Ylisstol is gutted and we've abandoned it for the time being, against Emmeryn's wishes. We've also left Ylisstol since Fredrick's worried that there would be additional assassins in the castle town." Robin buried her face in her hands. "Those bastards, those conniving bastards." She snarls into her hands.

"Why do you think they hit…hell, everyone?"

"I was hoping you could tell me." Robin looks…really tired. Must've been a rough two weeks for her.

"This is not what I expected, so I only have guesses." I raise my hand and start ticking off fingers. "One, they wanted to show us that nowhere is safe to damage morale. Two, they wanted to get Emmeryn to a less guarded position before finishing her off for greater effect."

…

"What, no three?" Robin asks after a brief pause.

"I had a three but I don't remember what it is." Whatever that reasoning was it existed for a glorious fifteen seconds.

"Well, if they tried to break morale then they failed, badly." Robin looks determined. "The Ylissean citizenry are of the belief that a nation who willingly and gleefuly attacks civilians are worthy of their rage; the towns are levying troops and the ranks have filled amazingly fast. All we need now is an attack order from Emmeryn and they'll probably drive all the way to Plegia castle."

…

That might be why.

"Are you feeling ok?" Robin asks when she sees my face pale. (It feels like it paled)

Shit, this boulder just went off the slippery slope in a _big _hurry.

"Yeah, I'm…fine. What else happened?"

"Nothing much, interestingly enough." Robin stretches. "Plegia doesn't seem to want to invade Ylisse. Their logistical situation must be worse than I thought. Apart from some sporadic engagements between their Wyverns and our Pegasus Knights there hasn't been a whole lot of fighting…for the past two weeks there hasn't been any major movement from Plegia at all."

Oh shit it might actually be why.

Oh shit oh shit oh shit

_Stop panicking. It's not doing you any good._

Right. Right. Deep breaths, Deep breaths.

"Are you okay?" Robin asks, and before I can give an answer…

I hear someone running into the OH JESUS CHRIST

"Hi Nino." I'm sputtering! My ribs! Nino!

_Warning. Warning. Oxygen deprivation occurring. Too much force being applied by fourteen year old girl._

"Thank the gods you're ok." Nino chokes. Was she crying?

_About us? Not likely._

"Yeah…uh…please let me breathe." I feel the crushing hold loosen just a tiny, tiny bit.

"See? Nothing to worry about." Robin says cheerily, patting Nino's head.

Nino mumbles something in reply.

I pat her on the head because death choke aside she's adorable.

…

…

So it's another day before I can (read: allowed to) walk around the makeshift camp.

I say makeshift because honestly the Shepherds just took residence in a complex of buildings.

"This isn't just some random hideout you found, is it?" I had asked Chrom.

"No, this is an abandoned barracks the Shepherds used to use as a base." Chrom had explained, which made me think he used to use it as a hidey spot as a little kid.

Either way, it's barely large enough to house the Shepherds, not exactly comfortably (compared to our lodgings in the castle) but reasonably enough. Once I move out of the hospital I'll be bedding in the…communal bedroom. At least until chapter eight happens.

I also found out other bits of information about the horribly off-script chapter six.

Number one: A lot of servants died, enough to cripple the castle in terms of manpower.

_This also sours the castle as a residence in general, at least until it's properly cleaned out._

Number one point five: A lot of nobles died as well, namely the ones ballsy enough to organize a defense.

_Which means Ylisse is currently being run by the less active Nobles (and the ones not as aligned with Emmeryn). I can't possibly foresee how that can go wrong for us._

Number two: Chrom has reason to believe that all the assassins were caught and killed (except one).

_By the virtue of Having Played the Game I know Validar is still alive._

Number three: Gaius, the only assassin (technically a thief, but who's counting) to survive had told us that the attack was aimed specifically at killing everything moving within the castle, and the servants just happen to be the easiest kills.

_This is all in line with what Robin said earlier, more or less._

Number four: The Grimleal is suspected to be involved, but that's a bit of a freebie.

_Emmeryn also issued a statement very fast that the worshippers of Naga are NOT (in size 32 Bold Arial, no less) going to exact unnecessary retribution on the peaceful worshippers of Grima. The results were…mixed._

Five: In a rather brilliant public relations move, Robin had spread the information (read: rumor) that Marth, the great king of The First Game, was responsible for protecting the Exalt, who was the target of the attack (read: reasonable reasoning before Gaius came along), and that the assassins only targeted the helpless women and guards IN THE MIDDLE OF THE NIGHT because they were afraid of the High King.

_Obviously we know that the Grimleal were just trying to kill everything that moved, but that makes less sense than the publicly issued reason._

Five point One: This had the profound effect of causing Ylissean (and Feroxi) morale to skyrocket and was almost singlehandedly responsible for the massive influx of soldiers that Emmeryn didn't know what to do with. Granted, she hasn't issued a general call to arms so it's less of an army and more several groups of militias.

_Based on what Sumia told us militias are ignoring Emmeryn entirely and taking the fight to Plegia, with rather poor results. Plegian troops aren't as good as properly trained soldiers, but they're certainly better than rabble._

Number Six: Cordelia has joined. This worries me since she's about half a chapter too early, but she was pulled off the border patrol per request from the…wow I really can't remember her name. Pegasus Knight Commander Lady. Well, the Commander pulled two knights from the border patrol and inserted them into the Shepherds: Cordelia, and Ash's Favorite Pegasus Knight.

_This assumes we're skipping chapter seven entirely, since Emmeryn doesn't seem to enjoy running away from a problem very much. This also means the mole in Ylisse is still hidden, but considering the political climate that's a non-issue. This also ALSO means that the Ylisse air force is still very much intact, which is always a good thing._

Six point Five: The Knight's name is actually Amelia! I asked her a little and it seems like she's a far, far, FAR descendants of the Amelia in Sacred Stones.

_More specifically, Awakening!Amelia said that "she received her name from a distant ancestor, who was a great hero of her era.". It doesn't really explain how her bloodline could've made it across an ocean that doesn't get a whole lot of traffic. I suppose it's a situation similar to Nino here._

Which makes me think that the cataclysm that happened in Awaken's backstory is the same one that trashed Sacred Stones in the epilogue.

_It wasn't world ending in Sacred Stones._

It isn't world ending in Awakening.

_Point._

Anyways, I got a lot of ribbing for "finally being united with my one true love" which I'm still getting taunts for and will probably continue to get teased about for the foreseeable future.

_Amelia doesn't seem to care all that much. She's…very professional._

For the record, imagine Amelia's portrait in Sacred Stones, give her long, bronze-ish colored hair, and age her up until she's 18, and you have our Amelia.

I never paid much attention to Amelia in the Spotpass things so I don't even know if she's in there, let alone what her art looks like.

ANYWAYS

Nino and Amelia now have some kind of odd rivalry, which is weird since Nino is four years younger than she is.

And Cordelia in real life would win like every beauty pageant ever, it's…actually a little off-putting.

Her hair is still the most awesomely beautiful thing ever.

It shines like my cat's fur.

_What?_

My cat has really sleek and shiny fur; he looks utterly beautiful during the time span of "one day after bath."

_Well, yeah, but still, what?_

…

I think I need to talk to someone that's not my own mind for a little.

_Will that make you stop blaming yourself for something we have zero control over?_

Probably not.

I also need to watch out for a small green haired girl who seems to be stalking me all of a sudden.

But maybe that's just more paranoia talking.

_You also need to maintain your equipment._

And…most importantly, I need a way to fight Validar and Gangrel.

_Are you going to fight Gangrel at all? Since we have, y'know, a gun?_

Given the odds of finding Exactly Validar during the entire assassination I think we're going to end up fighting Gangrel during chapter 11.

_So…what do you plan to do?_

Well…Validar kinda sorta kicked our ass in a melee, and Gangrel is better than he is at melee. Ergo, Gangrel will kill us.

We have charging speed thanks to the shoes, but that's not the same as agility. I can rocket around a battlefield all I want, but I will have to get in physical range at some point, and when I do…I lose.

_Maybe you can just practice harder?_

I'm pretty sure I won't be able to beat Gangrel's lifetime of experience with just a few weeks of intense training. So…plan B.

I need a melee weapon that'll break Gangrel down with one hit, because odds are I'll only get a single hit.

…

_You know what we need to make, right?_

Yes, oh so much yes.

"You okay over there?" Vaike's staring at me because I have a stupid grin on my face.

"Yeah, I'm fine." I'm just going off into la la land, don't worry about me.

…

Although, unlike the rifle which is just built out of scrap metal, I'm going to need to build the components of the melee weapon entirely from scratch.

Welp.

"Hey, Ricken."

"Yeah?"

"Can you point me to some ink?" I wish I had a ball point pen.

.

.

.

{ === + === }

Assassination comes and leaves, and we practically skip Chapters Seven, Eight, Nine, and Ten because of it.

I'm not entirely happy with this variation of the assassination, but it made more sense for the assassins to just devastate the castle due to a lack of conservation of detail and drive Emmeryn out of its walls.

And besides, I feel like listening to someone go "Well I wanted to kill the President (or whoever runs your country, dear reader) but your friend was just an easier target" hits closer to home.


	11. From - A Table Full Of Notes

Ricken's peering over my shoulder. "So what are you working on?"

"Things." I get terse when I get focused.

"What kind of things?"

"Fighting-based things."

"Hmm…" Goddamit Ricken read the mood I DON'T WANT DISTRACTIONS RIGHT NOW

"Are you working on a new weapon?" Miriel asked.

Uh… "Yes."

I can just feel her exasperation. "I'll alert Maribelle."

"I'm only working on the theory behind it. It'll take me at least a week to get materials together to make the weapon." I say as fast as I can.

"I'll alert Maribelle, just as a precaution." Miriel corrects herself.

"So what are you working on?" Ricken persists in asking.

Ah…fuck it, I hit a bottleneck anyways.

I stretch. "A melee weapon designed to break the enemy's weapon."

"Oh really?" Ricken peers at my notes. "This looks really complicated. This is a single weapon?"

Well I wanted to add a nail launcher to it, but… "Yeah, it is."

"How does it work?"

"I'm not entirely sure yet." I shrug.

"What?" Ricken stares at me, wide eyed.

"Well…there are a couple of issues I ran across." I mutter.

"Like…?"

_Imagine that I'm speaking all of this in very roundabout technobabble._

Basically I intend to make a melee weapon that compensates for my lack of physical prowess with magical buffs.

Fire causes "burns" but doesn't cause "burning". I had determined through trial runs with the rail gun that fire spells isn't combustion. It does, however, heat the air. The rate of heating isn't very high though, so I can't just make a wide-area fire spell and burn thousands of people alive; I don't have the magic power for that, and a caster-less spell circle would require so much spirit powder that it would be more efficient just hire mercenaries with the money and they would do a better job.

_Caster-less spell circle?_

Basically the spell pages I use for my railgun; their spell power output is independent from the mage that's casting it.

_Also, why not sword of fire?_

It doesn't burn, so it's less a "sword of burning death" and more a "sword of mild discomfort". Not enough increase in damage output to justify making it heavier with spirit dust.

_So why not more spirit dust for power?_

At that point it would just be easier to use the spell book independently from the sword.

Anyways.

Thunder causes "shock" and electricity but can't…I dunno, I can't use it to rotate moving parts, and every attempt has ended in failure so far. My Rail gun works with a butchered variant of magnetic repulsion and doesn't actually contain any real moving parts, hence why it works. Hell, even the loader doesn't contain any parts: I just drop the damned nail into the chamber and force it to float via more spell circles.

In other words, I can't use thunder the way I wanted to for the melee weapon, because it can't operate as an engine.

_Why not just run thunder spells through the blade?_

It...doesn't do anything. I tried. Incidentally it also means that a Levin Sword is forged differently from my expectations, since my enchanted blade didn't do anything other than tingle mildly.

So that just leaves wind. (And technically dark but I'm pretty sure I would end up hurting myself more than the other guy if I ended up using dark.)

Wind causes "impact" but it's very dependent on the cross area of the target. My shoes work because their target is, y'know, the ground, and that's everywhere. The only reason why wind spells are effective against fliers (and not even that well) is because the wind just throws off the fliers.

_Incidentally, the reason why Pegasus Knights are so damn resilient against wind spells is because Pegasi are very stable fliers compared to Wyverns. Wyverns are kind of the Jack-of-all-trades type fliers, and we haven't seen a Griffon yet._

In any case.

If I wanted to spin a moving part it needs a large enough cross area or a powerful enough blast of wind, and either options has its own problems: a large enough cross section requires me to scale up the weapon and would end up making the rotation part heavier, since lighter metals like aluminum or titanium isn't readily available (and honestly I can't recognize them even if they existed), and a powerful enough blast of wind consumes spirit dust and has the potential to blow the weapon apart.

That would be a little unpleasant.

Thus, the bottleneck is…I don't know how to make the blade.

_In case you're wondering, right now Ricken is totally lost (mainly because he doesn't know why I used my time for this research) and Miriel is just **overjoyed **at the pseudo-technobabble._

Option one was to make a blade of pure spell power, but that doesn't work because the cross area of weapon-to-weapon impact is fucking TINY. I can't break the enemy weapon with a spell, either, so this is right out.

Option two is to use spell power to vibrate the blade. I don't have the engineering skill to make a sword like that do anything except shake itself apart, and I don't have the spell power required to make the blade vibrate at the frequency required to give it the cutting edge it needs.

Option three is…to make a chain sword. The problem there is the lack of enough propulsion required for spinning the chain and the need to replace any damaged chains that invariably occur. Basically I would trade a developmental nightmare for a maintenance one.

And the chain sword might not have enough rotation to cut through layers of (enchanted?) steel to begin with, which is what I need it to do.

Hmm…

_At this point we've stopped explaining entirely and just went into nerd developer mode._

The chain doesn't necessarily need jagged teeth…I just need to make sure it's moving fast enough to cut materials down with one swing.

I can scale it up to a two-handed sword and it would probably give me more leeway in terms of creating the edge and the rotational components.

However, if I made it huge and heavy (hell, heavier than my rifle, which is already like twenty, thirty pounds) and I can't swing it fast enough…even if it's a one-shot kill on connection it won't do anything because I can't connect with it.

Ugh.

_And that's why it's taken us three days and two jars of ink to get this far._

At the very least (with the help of some locals) we managed to scope out the blacksmiths in this town, so that's good.

_It's taken you three days to make about 5% of total progress._

…yeah.

…Epiphany!

I can…no, wait, shit, that doesn't solve the miniaturization issue.

Bummer.

_That's how it's been for the past three days._

Hmm…

…

[3rd person camera]

…

"Has he been like that this whole time?" Ricken asks Nino as they watch Ash pace around the table with his notes on it.

"Probably." Nino shrugs.

…

[1st person camera]

…

UUUUUUUUGH

…

[3rd person camera, somewhere else]

…

"Are you serious, Emm?" Chrom scowls. "I can't believe they would do this."

"Their anger is…well, well expected." Emmeryn sighs and then motions to the messenger. "Thank you for your services, you may go."

Robin walks in to the small room as the messenger exits. "What happened?" She asks.

"The idiots from Anea and Gracea took an army into Plegian lands." Chrom replied. "Without our permission, mind you."

"What?" Robin was fairly sure this was new to her.

"Anea and Gracea are two of our holdings that border Plegia, much like Themis." Emmeryn replied. "Their ruling nobility has always been a bit…eager to wage war." She sighs. "They were my father's retainers, and held those lands as a safeguard against Plegian attack if his war ever went sour."

"Well…" Robin said slowly. "It stands to reason that the people would be angry following what happened at the castle." Robin idly tapped her fingers on her spell book. "So why is this problematic for us?"

"It's bad for Emmeryn since she's going to be blamed regardless of if this expedition succeeds or fails." Chrom jumps to his feet and paces around, trying to calm himself down.

Robin nods. "She loses her image as a peacekeeper if they win. If they lose, she loses her image as a protector of the nation. Sounds like a horrible deal to me."

Emmeryn frowns. "My position is unimportant. There's an army of two thousand soldiers currently bound for Plegian lands, and I fear for the bloodshed and horror that will occur if they are allowed to let their anger dictate their actions."

Robin frowns as well. "Oh, yeah…Chrom?"

Chrom just looks at Emmeryn.

Emmeryn stands up. "I have orders for the Shepherds." Chrom kneels. "Intercept and stop our army from marching beyond our borders."

Robin blinks in surprise. "What?"

Emmeryn takes a deep breath. "I will not let my people die for something as insignificant as rage…this attack of theirs will serve no purpose. They must be convinced to stop."

"Understood, Emm." Chrom stands up. "Let's go, Robin. How soon can we leave?"

"I got everything ready to go; we can leave immediately if you want." Robin says with a confident (and cocky) grin.

"Did you think we were going on a mission when you came in here?" Chrom asks, surprised.

Robin shrugs. "Well, I had a hunch."

…

[1st person camera again]

…

I hear a lot of movement.

Is something happening?

"Oy! Vaike! What's going on?!" I shout to the nearest person I see.

"Chrom's orders! We're moving out!"

We're…what?

I don't have my stuff ready! I don't even have spare nails!

"Looks like you're getting cold feet, Ash." Robin says as she walks by me writing something down on her notebook.

…Where did she get her pen anyways? I want one of those.

"I don't have my gear ready." I say bluntly.

"No surprises there; you've been busy doing god knows what ever since you got out of bed." Robin grumbles. "Have your girlfriend ferry you to our lines once you get your stuff together."

Girlfrie-oh, Amelia.

_For the record Amelia spends her time training and running routine patrols with the rest of the Ylissean air force, since she's a professional soldier first and an aide second. So I haven't seen her for the past three days at all._

"Right. Thanks." I need to get my sword working, fast. But before that. "Nino."

"You want me to go with them, right?" Nino has her bag already over her shoulder.

"Looks like you decided before I asked." I grin. She smirks in return. "Be careful out there."

"I'll be good!" Nino laughs and hurries off after Robin.

A happy Nino is a cute Nino.

_And if you remember, she considers you a replacement goldfish for Linus._

Since she told me yesterday, yes, I remember.

…

Wouldn't I be more like Lloyd though?

_We're not as cool as Lloyd._

…

Anyways, I need to figure out how to make the damn blade and describe it to someone who's never heard about its design mechanics _now._

…

…

[Next day]

…

…

Ok, ok, I got it, I definitely got it. I think.

I think.

"You want me to make what?" The blacksmith is…not convinced.

Either that or he thinks I'm nuts.

"This." I tap the blueprint again.

"You must be joking, boy." The man growls.

"Not joking. Make it, make it fast, and you'll be paid extra." I have money. I'm a little confused as to how I ended up with this money, but I have money.

Plus it's not like I'm spending anything close to 3000 gold for this thing.

_Which is still pretty steep for a single weapon, forging aside._

"Pah, fine." The man takes the blueprint. "When do you want it done?"

…

...

Ok, that makes…the hilt, the base, the center...the reinforcements, joints…ok, that's everything.

I want an engineering corps, like, just dedicated to making my shit.

…

_What about defense?_

I already got people working on that. Way easier than making a sword from scratch.

_It took us four days to design a sword, but twenty minutes to make a shield._

Technically it took us two weeks for the sword, since the idea was already in my head at that point.

…

…

[3rd person camera, elsewhere]

…

…

Chrom and the Shepherds rode at top speed (limited by their supply wagon) towards the Ylissean army, intent on stopping them from attacking into Plegian lands.

And occasionally stopping to fend off the wild Risen.

So there's really nothing new happening there.

…

…

[1st person camera again]

…

…

Ok, finally. I got all my shit together.

Five days later.

FIVE.

Jesus Christ.

I wanted everything done by day three.

It's now day five.

Five is a number greater than three.

A blacksmith can make like…actually I don't know how long it would take for a Fire Emblem Universe smith to make a sword. Hmm.

_Dude? Getting sidetracked._

Sorry.

Ahem.

Now I need to piece everything together according to these IKEA weaponry blueprints that I drew.

Ok. I have all the parts laid out in front of me on this gigantic dining table.

Let's see…handle contains spell paper and a little bit of dust…

Center base contains magic paper, quite a lot of magic powder…oh, geez, this is heavy. Well I won't have to worry about the blade being top-heavy, although this cuts into my attack power…but I have a solution for that.

Rotation components…set. Oil…oil…here we go.

…

Science is great at finding out new and inventive ways to kill the bejesus out of people.

Especially when magic is involved.

…

The blade…attaches here...ok, got it.

Blade two…attaches…ugh. The fixture is a little too big. Go…go in…GO IN! OK. I really need to make a hammer.

...

I can feel Amelia look at me with worry since I'm muttering to pieces of metal.

...

Blade three…Do I need to attach blade three now? I don't think so. I'm pretty sure I don't need this now.

Ok then, Blades three, four and five go into my surplus bag.

_I still can't believe the guy gave us enough parts to make five blades._

And he was the first done, too. He got a huge bonus for that…good thing I got this weapon made before the war engine got started.

Shielding component, set.

Jet components one through four…spell paper, magic powder, set, ready. Five and six go into the surplus bag for field repairs.

This is going to oh Jesus Christ this thing is heavy.

It's like twice as heavy as my rifle.

Once again, thank god this isn't top heavy, but I need to figure out how to swing this thing. All of my skill so far has been practiced with a single-hand sword in mind.

Blade sheathes, attach…ok. Service motors…comparatively not as ok. They barely move. That's not right. Maybe I forgot a step.

Let's see…

Aha. Hook this part in…ok, cool. It works like I want it to.

…

My nerd instincts are squee-ing _SO **HARD**_ right now.

_You have a technology boner?_

A metaphorical, gargantuan technology induced phallical masterpiece.

_Phallical Masterpiece would make a good band name._

...What kind of band would that be, actually?

"Ok, uh…do you think oh shit." I shoulder the sword and almost immediately lose my balance.

Scratch that, I actually lost my balance.

Right now there's like 70 pounds of equipment on my back, and I don't think I balanced the load anywhere near properly.

On the plus side, there's 70 pounds of equipment on my back and I can still stand up.

"Are you alright, sir?" Amelia asks worriedly, as I regain my footing.

My thanks to Fredrick for making me carry my rifle near 24-7. On the downside, if I want to move with any sort of agility I'll need to drop them before battle starts.

_You have wind shoes._

"Yeah, yeah. I think I need to move things around if I want to carry this into battle, though." Let's see…oh well. I'll just have to bear with it for the moment. My rifle is slung over my right shoulder and my sword is being carried over my left.

For the record, my sword is about as long as the rifle, which is saying a lot since most of the rifle's length is because of the rails.

_My sword is longer than your average sword, by about 50% longer. No there's no innuendo at all._

I think we lost all credibility of no innuendo at "Phallical Masterpiece."

"Are you going to use something that cumbersome in battle?" Amelia asks with a frown.

"I'm going to try." I would shrug but my shoulders won't move. I didn't think this through very well did I?

In nearly unrelated news, I also have my…ta da! Magic Blocking Buckler.

It looks like your average round buckler, but its insides are gouged out and replaced with wooden plates mounted on springs.

_We had to explain to the blacksmith how to make springs without really understanding the physics behind it_.

That was a fun thirty minutes.

The shield operates as thus! If I see a spell coming, I unload a wooden plate into the direction of the spell via wind-energized spring propulsion, and because spells have a tendency to explode on contact with each other (god knows why), this should stop a spell mid-flight and give me the advantage.

_"Can we make use of that advantage" is the question._

"Can your Pegasus fly with an extra…200 pounds of weight?" I ask her. Me plus my gear is roughly 200 pounds, give or take a little. I'm not a very heavy guy, though I'm pretty sure I've gained some muscle weight due to my time here.

"Shouldn't be a problem." Amelia shrugs. "I'm ready to leave at any time, sir."

"Ok, let's go then." She helps me up the Pegasus because I'm having trouble walking, and then she hops onto the Pegasus in front of me.

So I get to hug a girl as she flies me into a probable battlefield.

…

…

…

Turns out Pegasi are pretty stable on long term flight…might be because they have more magical power than Wyverns? I dunno. I haven't ridden a wyvern before, so I can't compare.

Let's see… Emmeryn's directions were…over…here. Ok.

I tap Amelia on the shoulder and point left with my thumb over her shoulder, so she can see without twisting her head, and we bank and turn left.

…

…

Looks like the army stopped before going into a narrow mountain pass. There's a set of fairly steep cliffs to their left (if the army is facing Plegia) and to the left is…trees. A lot of trees that probably hamper army movement.

_Couldn't you have just said forest?_

Hmm…I see some movement from a small group in a middle of a larger one. Did Chrom get into a duel or something? It's hard to tell, and I can't ask Amelia.

_Why ask her?_

She probably has better eyes.

…

As we get closer, I see…

I see Wyvern Riders. Probably Plegians.

Oh…is this the same army that would normally appear in chapter seven? If Emmeryn never evacuates to the secondary castle it stands to reason that the army used to capture her would do something else…hmm. I don't know if this is considered bad luck or not.

No point worrying about that right now though.

I tap Amelia's shoulder again and I point down (again with my thumb). She turns and looks at me, as if to ask "are you sure?"

I nod.

And we descend.

…

Amelia puts us a fair distance from the fight, on top of a hill.

"Should I join the battle, sir?" She asks as soon as I jumped off (and landed on all fours on the ground).

"Yeah, join our Peg Knights, don't get killed." I say distractedly as I unsling my rifle and brace it against on a tree branch.

_A tree branch attached to a live tree, mind you._

"Understood, good luck to you, sir." Amelia salutes and takes off.

Ok…

Rifle time.

_Imagine the chapter seven map with the good guys coming from the right side instead of the left and the bottom replaced by a giant mix of forest and grass tiles._

…

…

[3rd person camera]

…

…

Chrom and the Shepherds had met with the Ylissean army, and were in the process of talking it out when Plegia made the first strike, diving upon the army of levy and villager soldiers with savagery only attainable by Wyverns (and poleaxes).

Naturally, Robin immediately tried to take command of the situation while the main army archer and mages tried to fend off the Plegian Wyvern Riders with nominal success.

To their credit, the Anean and Gracean nobility were no slouches in combat.

"7th Archer squad! Left two! 9th Archer squad, back one!" The Anean noble roared, not taking his eyes from the sky, even when a Wyvern swooped down at him.

With one swift stroke, he cut the Wyvern open from head to tail as it swooped dangerously low over his head. The Wyvern corpse crashed into the ground behind him, unseating its rider into the waiting arms of a mercenary, who quickly stabbed the poor rider's throat while the rider was still dazed from his crash landing.

"We are the trusted knights of the King! Don't think you can win against us so easily!" He snarled.

"Chrom, we should pull back from here. Plegia won't send just wyverns and we certainly don't have enough air units." Robin warned him.

"Do you feel like explaining that to them?" Chrom asked tiredly, pointing to the two Ylissean nobles bellowing orders to their men.

Orders that were being followed by the professional soldiers and nobody else.

In other words, near pandemonium with the professionals doing their jobs and the levy army doing…whatever the hell they were doing, I don't even know. Is this the first time the villagers ever saw a Wyvern?

"Look!" Lissa suddenly pointed to a new Pegasus Knight swooping into the battle from the east. Robin didn't have to guess who it was.

As if on cue, a Wyvern soldier suddenly flipped awkwardly in midair and crashed to the ground with a dull thud, dead on impact.

"About time he showed up." Robin grumbles.

…

…

[1st person camera]

…

…

Got him. Looks like the strengthening worked out pretty well, too.

Since my sniping didn't work out so well in the chapter five battle, I increased the power of the thunder spells used to accelerate the projectiles and added a third page, so I can still do low power sniping in short range (though I don't think that'll be a problem at this point) and have enough long range death to hit from…hell, a long, long ways away.

This does force the rifle to use just a tiny bit of spirit dust at full power, though, which is unfortunate. Each bullet now costs me like 50G…at least it's not Sasha.

_The range is still not as long as a traditional sniper rifle, because, y'know, it's still a ramshackle weapon._

I'm not very good at estimating distances, so I have no idea how far it reaches now.

Second target…sighted. Oh…

Uh, well, shit.

I forgot to get a new scope to compensate for the new settings.

…

Oh well, I'm not exactly shooting at maximum range from this position anyways, and my target is a Wyvern's soft underbelly, not a heavily armored knight.

_Fvoom~ The Wyvern shuddered and fell, twisting in the air due to the top-heavy nature of having a mounted man and no more propulsion. The man-beast combo fell to the ground, probably ending up as a fairly nasty mess of blood and gore._

Second target, down.

_How are you hitting them from here?_

I'm waiting until they either stop to hover or when they fly towards my general direction.

I don't know how fast the projectiles are travelling, so I can't really lead the targets, and compared to a videogame the Wyverns have pretty erratic flight trajectories due to their anti-archer/mage evasive flying.

Factoring in the inherent inaccuracy due to the nail moving in the chamber and it's a wonder I can hit anything at all.

I really should've practiced with the new settings when I had time.

_Fvoom~ Miss. The target appear to be unaffected._

Note to self: stop tempting fate.

He stopped moving though. What an idiot.

_Fvoom~ Clean hit to his chest and the corpse flailed but wasn't dismounted. The Wyvern probably sensed its rider's death, since it immediately turned around and flew in the direction of Plegian lands._

Got him this time.

…

Damn, Wyvern captain is smart. They're pulling out.

I don't see anything resembling a land army.

So who was Chrom fighting with?

_We don't have perfect vision. Want to bet on him not having a fight at all?_

…Point.

…

…

I un-brace the rifle and sling it over my back, and then hear a Pegasus landing close to me.

God I love Amelia. She had the grace to fly back here and pick me up, so I wouldn't have to roll down a hill with my heavy ass equipment.

…

…

"I thought it was you." Robin said, glancing at the protrusions on my back as I dismounted from the Pegasus with great difficulty.

"Yep. I got my new sword forged, finally." Though to be fair it wasn't so much "forged" as "pieced together from a lot of moving parts." Also they're digging into my shoulders and it's a little painful.

"It looks…nice." Chrom said slowly, having gotten a look at the thing. He taps the shielding edge, as if testing it. Judging by the frown it probably failed his test.

"I haven't had the chance to practice with it, so it's going to be interesting on how it works."

"Should I call Maribelle then?" Lissa asked, pointing to Maribelle's general direction (Maribelle's tending to the injured in the "main army").

"Uh…no. This guy" I pat the grip "is built to kill the target in a single hit, So Maribelle won't help much."

"For all of your ingenuity, it certainly wouldn't hurt you to train seriously to make up for your shortcomings." Fredrick said, with a barest hint of a smile.

"Well, yeah. But…I'm not going to be able to catch up to a seasoned veteran with just a few days' worth of training. I'm not looking to just survive, y'know." I need to _win. _And I need to win decisively enough to put Plan B of the anti-Grima plan into motion.

"As long as you don't hit any of us with it." Robin said absentmindedly. "Chrom, we need to meet with the nobles before this gets any worse."

Chrom jumps a little. "Right, I'm on my way."

…

…

And I get to follow them.

…

I see… Chrom, Robin, and two guys are probably the Nobles. One of them has graying hair, moustache, and walks like he owns the place. The other one is…a little taller, quite a bit younger (late 20s? maybe?) and a little less muscular.

_So we have the Old Guy and the Young Guy._

"With all due respect, _your highness_," One of the nobles was saying as I got to hearing range. "Our men are livid at the…disrespect, Plegia has shown for their fellow humans, and we fully intend to remind _them_ how real men behave." He points to where Plegia retreated to for emphasis. "While Emmeryn's peaceful policies might be welcome years ago and years hence, we are at war _now._"

"The Exalt is worried about the reasoning behind your sudden and swift attack into Plegian territory." Robin said coolly. She's doing the negotiating for Chrom, since he's more of the slash and stab type. "She's worried that by attacking now you risk creating more hatred within Plegia, which does not serve anyone's purpose."

"Hatred? Oh, if it's just hatred, it'll be just grand!" The older noble laughs. "We're not going to a battle out of hate, lady; we fight for vengeance."

...Isn't that the same thing?

"We fight because they killed out of sport. We fight because if we do not, Plegia will erode us into the ground." He snarls, and then takes a deep breath. "I respect Emmeryn, believe me. She has her father's iron will and love for Ylisse, even if she expresses it in a different fashion, and her ideology on peace through understanding is laudable. However…right now? Right now, we don't need that kind of peace, especially when the other side could care less."

"That's all fine and good, but what are you going to do after marching into Plegian land?" I ask him.

"Who in the hells are you?" The other noble, the young guy, asks with a frown.

I spare him a glance. "A Shepherd. You don't need to know more than that. What are you going to do when you get into Plegia? Burn a few villages? Kill some innocents, just to be sure?" I'm trying to get a rise out of them.

Chrom and the two nobles all scowl at me. Mission successful! (I think?)

"We are not savages on the warpath, boy." The older noble warns me. "I suggest you stop thinking of us as such."

"So what are you going to do?" Robin presses on, catching my drift. "Do you plan to march straight to Plegian castle?"

"By the will of Naga that is exactly what we plan to do." The younger Noble says…a little too quickly.

Hmm…

"And how do you plan to do that?" I ask with a sigh. "How do you plan to support a two thousand strong army through Plegia, which, to the best of my memory, is desert and wasteland from here to the castle?"

I get some weird looks, probably because I'm guessing on the army size based on snippets of conversation from the soldiers.

"How do you…nevermind." Robin shakes her head. "Regardless of his…memory, how _do_ you plan to support an army of this size through hostile territory?"

"Uh…" The younger noble glances at the first one, who has an "I know, right?" expression flicker across his face.

I guess it's not really a partnership these two nobles have, huh.

"I'm sure we will find ways to support our forces, should we move fast enough." The younger noble says without an ounce of confidence. I almost feel sorry for him.

_You should feel sorrier for his men._

…Yeah, I guess.

"So who the hell organized this expedition in the first place?" I ask.

The older noble draws very close to me. "You should be aware of who you are questioning, young man." He says with a hiss.

"I'm questioning the idiot that decided to organize a two thousand strong army with no supply train to back them up." I stare into his eyes…the man has good eyes. I don't think he's responsible for this.

_Good eyes?_

Yeah, like…y'know.

_No I don't know._

Point being, I don't think he's responsible for drawing up this hideously poor plan.

"Good words, young man. Spoken like a true man hiding under the umbrella of the Shepherds." He smirks.

"Uh, gentlemen?" Robin raises her hand to get our attention. "Hate to break up the party, but we have Plegians coming again."

We all turn and look…

Wow, those are the shiniest soldiers I think I've ever seen.

"Plegian Great Knights." Chrom breathed. "When did Plegia get these guys on their borders? Robin!"

_Great Knights as in the other Cavalier Promotion._

"Got it!" Robin leaves in a big hurry. "Ash, do your thing!" She shouts over her shoulder.

Do my thing? I'm pretty sure I can't snipe them hard enough to hurt, I literally got my nails from the blacksmith reject pile!

_Also known as "the apprentices"._

…

…

The terrain is actually in our advantage this time, if only slightly. The ground here is gently sloping, with the Plegian side being lower than the Ylissean side.

I don't think it matters all that much right now.

"Kellam! Heavy Infantry! Form ranks!" Robin, in the timespan of thirty seconds, took command over the entire army. "Volunteer captains! Look to your men!" She yells as the Heavy Infantry either form tight ranks with their shields braced on the ground or look around and wonder who the hell Kellam is.

The Volunteer captains are unit leaders of the Villager troops, and they're…uh, disorganized.

_Their level of organization is entropy personified._

Good god is this not going to go over well.

"Virion, you have the archers." Robin nods at Virion.

Virion raises his bow. "Hear me, Gentlemen of the bow! Form ranks and prepare to fire!" I'm not gonna question it, I'm not gonna question it…

It's a good thing we're not in the middle of some god-awful open plains or this would go amazingly poorly.

"All free units! Take down some trees and use them as cover against cavalry!" Robin yells next.

All free units meaning cavalry, mages, and villagers, and they quickly and brutally savage some trees and pull the trunks haphazardly between the incoming cavalry and themselves.

…

Ok, this is going to go a lot better than I thought.

…

That being said, the Plegian cavalry isn't doing a concerted charge, it looks more like a stampede than anything else.

"Heavy Infantry! Front line and brace!" Robin…has an amazing shouting voice.

Since I can't snipe from where I am (right next to Robin on a giant boulder, the only high ground vantage point I can get without leaving the battlefield entirely) I settle for staring at the incoming enemy through my scope.

_The vantage point isn't that high either, it's like...a foot and a half, tops. Or half a meter. We're only estimating here._

"Looks like their lead units are speeding up." I say to her.

"Yeah." Robin has her own little telescope. "Virion! Miriel!"

"At once, milady!" Virion laughs. "Now, gentlemen! Let loose the dogs of war!"

Holy shit that is a lot…ok, it's not really a lot of arrows. Plus I don't think they're barbed arrows, but it's still pretty visually impressive.

Virion organized the archers, which is…him, a handful of professionals (mercenaries, nobility) and a fair amount of volunteers (hunters mostly) and they've organized into three loose rows of rain of constant arrow violence onto the enemy.

It would be more impressive if the enemy looked like they cared.

Miriel, on the other hand, have her mages on guard duty.

Did I forget to mention the fact that the Plegian line is slinging spells at us?

Because they're totally slinging spells at us.

Plegia has the Gameboy Advance version of Fire, where the spell rises over the mage's head and then impact into the enemy. I would be worried except spells aren't affected by gravity, only travel distance, so…they have a weaker version of the spell, but it also means the enemy mages don't need to expose themselves in order to fire Fires at us.

_Their spells are literally raining over the front ranks of our troops, despite the best efforts of Miriel, Ricken, Nino, and the twenty-odd mages from the army to provide counter spell fire._

On the plus side, some of the spells are impacting into the tree trunks and end up scattering woodchips everywhere, primarily over our forces.

…Why the hell did I consider that to be a plus?!

"Ash." Robin doesn't take her eyes off of the enemy front line. "Hit the enemy mages. You can do that from here right?"

"Somewhat." We're standing on a sizable boulder for her to get vision. Let's see…target sighted, but I don't have a place to brace. XCOM Sniper grip time then: brace gun with my left arm, aim and fire with my right.

"Commencing fire." I say a little unnecessarily, but it sounds cool.

_That explains about 90% of the things you do._

Enemy mages…wow, they have an entire line of them, some of them girls. Of the mages I can see I can only see their head. I'm gonna feel like an asshole for doing this, but…

Chivalry is overrated.

_Fvoom~_ _While we can't see the enemy mages facial expressions, judging by how they recoiled the sight of one of their own suddenly having their head blown up the Plegian mages are not a happy group right now. Not happy and maybe just a tad disillusioned._

…

Five shots later the Plegian bombardment is pretty much done.

"That's…very effective, Ash." Robin says with some surprise.

"No surprise; I don't think they expected to take any fire at all." I grumble. On one hand I completed a mission objective…on the other hand it leaves a bad taste in my mouth.

The fact that I could read their body expressions and actually see them recoil in shock and fear every time one of their own bled over them didn't make it a lot better.

_You'll feel better after you kill more people._

Sad part is that's actually true.

Oh well…stay focused, it's us or them at the moment.

…

Enemy cavalry is flat out charging now, but there's no organization.

"Miriel!" Robin yells.

"Mages! Commence!" Miriel yells, and our twenty some odd mages open fire on the Plegian Cavalry.

With only limited effect, since their cavalry has enough maneuver space to run a little to either dodge the spells or take glancing blows from them.

_That explains why their cavalry isn't organized._

Also, the image of a heavily armored dude on a horse charging AT YOU while weathering the magic that's supposed to kill them easily is...demoralizing, to say the least.

Let's try…full power shot, aim…fire!

_Fvoom~ the cavalry knight is knocked back some, but judging by the fact that he didn't die the impact force isn't big enough._

Damn.

"Front lines! Brace!" Fredrick roars, having a much more commanding presence than Robin on the field.

Pity the army has very little actual cavalry for him to lord around.

The Plegians…are on the last stretch of the charge, and they've formed ranks.

Annnd…

Impact!

Yikes, Ylissean armored knights suck, even with the obstacles formed by the tree trunks.

That first charge blew past two and a half lines' worth of armored knights and only stopped because the bodies that piled up in front of them stopped momentum. I hope not all of our Armored Knights are dead.

_With charging power like that who needs line infantry?_

Fuck normal medieval tactics, we have Great Knights that can charge through everything.

"Sumia! Cordelia! Find the enemy general!" Chrom yells, as the enemy rank and file troops pretty much cut through our rank and file troops with disturbing ease.

…

Interestingly enough, Sumia and Cordelia (and Amelia) aren't harassed by the Plegian air force, largely because the Plegian air force is nowhere to be seen.

Does that mean the land force and air force were different units?

Hmm.

Wups, focus on the here and now; heavy cavalry headed our way.

…and Robin hits him (or her) square in the chest with an Arcthunder, killing the man immediately and frightening the bejesus out of the horse.

I…I'm a little jealous. "How'd you get your hands on that?"

"Before we left." She said distractedly.

I should've bought one too.

_A man just got fried in front of us and all we can think about is an Arcthunder tome._

…

Once the Plegian Great Knights got bogged down fighting the remaining Ylissean Armored Knights the Villagers charged out from the…not front lines, led by the two nobles. Although really it was less hiding and more "staying in the back until player turn".

…

Y'know, looking at this battlefield...

It's like a sea of people! And a couple of large armored horses, but mostly just people.

There are less Plegians but they're obviously much better trained and equipped, considering how heavily the enemy cavalry is invested in the sea of Ylissean peasants...according to most (Earthling) doctrines concerning cavalry, most cavalry don't stay in a close range combat with footsoldiers for very long, and definitely don't get bogged down in a hand to hand fight or risk getting pulled off of their horses. These guys don't seem to care in the slightest: they just swing their axes through the peasants while the heavily armored warhorse strolls through the villagers.

About the best we can say is…the trees accomplished more than the villagers have so far.

…

The Plegian Knights actually picked the lines apart pretty quickly, and the villager charge was kinda sucky at best. There are gaping holes between lines of infantries caused by the Great Knights dealing just absurd amounts of damage.

This is what it feels like to be on the other side of the Fire Emblem Full Stat Pain Train, I believe.

Shit, it's so hard to follow what's going on.

…

"Damn." Robin growls and fires a puff of fire over a combat zone and the fire explodes in midair into a…really, unusually bright red explosion.

Said combat zone is populated by villagers, a handful of Ylissean Armored Knights, and Plegian Great Knights killing everyone, and everyone stops for a moment to watch the unusually bright red ball over their head.

It's also amazingly far from where we are right now.

How did she see that far to begin with?

…

The zone is very quickly now populated by Fredrick, Sully, and a handful of Ylissean Cavaliers ramming into and killing Plegian Great Knights.

The zone is now a lot less populated by Plegian Great Knights.

...Actually, the zone is now a lot less populated by everything. Yikes.

…

For the next handful of minutes Robin is just shooting fire spells over the battlefield all over the goddamned place.

Hell, not only that. MULTICOLORED Fire spells.

"Where'd you learn to do that?"

"Your notes." Robin says without an ounce of apology, especially since I keep my…

Wait, what?

I'm confused. "I never tried to make multicolored spells." I mean, I theorized it, but…

"Yeah, you never did." She says absentmindedly, still focused on the battlefield.

_Oh you magnificent little-_

Well…ANYWAYS. She's using multicolored spells to help direct the battlefield. Red is cavalry support (led by Fredrick), Purple is Miriel/Virion support (depending on who's free), and Blue (a very light, sky blue) is Sumia/Cordelia support (plus Amelia).

_How the hell is she keeping up with any of this? I can't even process what's happening right now. I need the 3rd person camera from a strategy game! A turn based strategy game! With a hard cap of 50 units or so!_

Given the size of the battlefield, Robin's constantly shooting her three colors of flares over the battlefield at all times, enough to draw the attention of several Plegian Great Knights who tried to charge this position on the boulder many times. Apart from the Great Knights, some uppity Plegian mages would try and snipe this position with their spells every so often.

Robin's Arcthunder just shuts down any Great Knight ballsy enough to meet her. She doesn't miss, like, ever.

My Rifle makes the mages really scared to poke their head out of wherever they happen to be hiding. I happen to miss a lot, but generally a hit near enough to the poor mage in question with the poor quality nail causes the nail to fragment on contact with the ground and spray dirt everywhere like an explosive just went off.

Good partnership? Good partnership.

…

[Some time later]

…

A few minutes ago Sumia and Cordelia stopped flying all over the battlefield and settled to circle repeatedly over a spot on the battlefield. Judging by first appearances the Plegian Knights in the spot are a little bigger and shinier than the rest.

"Robin." Chrom says, drawing Falchion.

I would like to point out that the Shepherds (Robin excluded) have all been assisting the Ylissean mob in taking down Great Knights and are scattered (Chrom excluded) from our current location.

_For example, I have no fucking clue where Vaike oh wait he just punched a heavily armored war horse and brought it down. Nevermind. I know where he is now._

I would like to append to that observation: Vaike punched the war horse hard enough that it staggered and unseated the rider (by accident). So he just punched a horse out from under a grown man wearing full armor.

"Got it." Robin then fires a fire waaay over where Cordelia and Sumia were hovering, and the fire explodes in a shower of bright sparks when it reaches its flight path.

…She took my design document on fireworks! No wonder I couldn't find them after I came back from Themis.

But the effect is pretty instant. Every Shepherd (Nino included) instantly beelined toward that area.

_How can you tell?_

I saw Nino's bright green hair and extrapolated from there. Also Vaike commandeered a war horse (the same one he punched) and is headed toward that location.

"Let's go!" Robin jumps off of the boulder and dashes through the battlefield at an impressive speed.

…

WHY AM I SO SLOW

…

It just dawned on me how behind I am in terms of actual combat experience, especially when even Donnel is able to sift his way through the battle lines and keep pace with Chrom. Though to be fair Chrom isn't really "sneaking", he's just cutting a path through people.

"Sir." Amelia lands next to me.

"How do you keep doing this?" I ask her as she pulls me onto her Pegasus.

"We have good eyes, sir." Amelia laughs, and flies me over the lines into the Shepherd's main stage.

…

Fire Emblem: Where the lord of the game is actually in a small snippet of a larger battlefield.

Also where it's this eerie mix of loud and soft; there's a lot of ambient noise in terms of people yelling, weapons clashing, and so on, but…at the same time…I can hear everything in the smaller battlefield clearly.

Also Chrom is Leeroying himself right into the enemy front ranks almost immediately after the rest of the Shepherds gathered up.

I would be worried except he's Chrom and he's literally blowing the enemy knights off of their horses with each swing by sheer brute strength. No wonder Vaike considers him a rival.

I mean what the fuck man. Physics doesn't work that way.

_Why are we surprised by this? He has gifts, we don't. So we make it up by scientific badassery._

…Right.

I dismount.

Activate wind shoes! Draw railgun!

My sword is my ace in the hole, so no point revealing it now.

Let's rock this joint.

…

[3rd person camera]

…

Ash lands from Amelia's Pegasus and immediately floats a little in the air (there's like an inch and a half between his shoes and the ground). He draws his rifle, and skates forward into the nearest Plegian Heavy Cavalry.

With one (magic assisted) jump, he found himself face to face with the Plegian Knight.

The Plegian Knight found himself face to face with an exploding nail moments later, and the explosive force of the rail gun at point blank drove the man off his horse and into the ground with a spectacular flip.

Ash landed and nearly tripped, due to his landing involving only one of his two feet at first.

_Ok, I need to adjust that. _Ash thought, turning to his next target.

…

"Chrom, down!" Robin yells.

Chrom ducks down without question as a blade soars over his head. A few seconds later the knight swinging the blade died to an Arcthunder to the chest.

"Miriel, your right! Vaike, go!" Robin says and fires a blue flare off to her right.

Miriel glances to her right and jumps and rolls forward, avoiding the lance of a charging knight.

Said charging knight was then stopped by Vaike's powerful axe swing aimed at his horse's legs, bringing the knight forcibly to the ground in a spectacular crash before Miriel ended his life with a well aimed thunder.

The blue flare exploded over Ricken protecting an injured and heavily bleeding Donnel. Cordelia swooped down from the skies while tossing javelins at an astounding rate, and upon her landing she hoisted Donnel onto her Pegasus with an odd puff of green and immediately flew towards the back line, dropping him off with Lissa (being guarded by Virion and Stahl) once she arrived.

"Geez." Robin grumbles, and jumps onto a horse previously owned by a Plegian Knight. She then fires a blue flare far from her and a red flare direct north of her, a fair distance away.

Sumia dives from the skies and drives a Great Knight from his horse. Lon'qu, who was hitching a ride with Sumia, jumps off and finishes the Great Knight in question, and then commandeers the horse for his own use.

Fredrick (and Sully) flank a pair of enemy Great Knights, forcing them to turn around. As the knights did so Vaike and Chrom rushes in and with a decisive blow each finish them off.

"Ash!" Robin fires a white flare into the air.

"Holy hell that's bright." Ash grumbles as he aims his rifle in the air.

Moments later, a squadron of Wyvern Riders (4 of them) swoop into the battlefield.

Seconds later, two of them drop to the earth as the Wyverns lose their ability to stay flying.

"Shit, missed one." Ash snarls.

"Robin! I need a path!" Chrom yells, staring at the enemy lead unit.

Robin pulls her stolen horse closer to Chrom, peers at the line between him and the enemy general (under the reasoning that the man in charge has the shiniest armor)…

And fires a series of blue and purple flares in the line before firing a red flare over herself.

Instantly, the blue flare targets were struck by Cordelia, Sumia, and Amelia. The Purple targets were summarily shot by Miriel, Nino, and Robin herself, and Fredrick and Sully formed a small wedge along with Robin. The makeshift cavalry drove deep into the enemy's last guards with Chrom, Vaike and Gaius following the horses on foot.

"Why the hells do we have to run?!" Gaius moaned.

"Because we're MEN!" Vaike laughed.

A Plegian mage suddenly popped up from behind a charging Great Knight, firing spells at Chrom.

Chrom doesn't stop his charge, and the spells explode on top of a blue glowing barrier nested against his skin.

The mage barely had time to register the fact that someone casted a barrier spell over Chrom before his vision was suddenly blocked by the blade of Lon'qu.

The Plegian Knight in charge of said mage drew his sword and then felt something heavy hit his chest, and against his training looked down. Lon'qu, not wasting the opportunity, stabbed the Knight in the back of the neck.

"Whew. Now I actually owe Maribelle one." Ash mutters, opening up another pack of nails.

Ash is then suddenly very, very aware of the large looming shadow behind him.

…

Chrom reaches the enemy general, and without even a moment's hesitation charges forward with his battle roar, drawing his rapier with his left hand, shifting his Falchion to be wielded by only his right hand.

The General's two bodyguards ride to meet Fredrick and Sully, and Robin snaps her fingers, wrapping the two Ylissean riders in some form of magical power.

_It's Solidarity, in case you're wondering. (+10 hit, +10 crit in game)_

The left man attacks Fredrick with an overhead axe swing, but Fredrick blocks it with his shield and with one heavy thrust skewers the knight, penetrating cleanly through his armor.

The right man attacks Sully with his Lance, but Sully grabs it and urges her horse into a leap, unbalancing the man. Robin then follows up with an Arcthunder to the man's chest, blasting the now Great Knight Corpse clean off his horse.

"Damn!" The General pulls out his sword, realizing that he couldn't avoid a fight.

Fredrick makes way for Chrom, who runs up to the mounted general and immediately sidesteps to avoid a thrown Javelin headed his way.

"Vaike!"

"Yeah!" Vaike throws a hand axe at the armored horse, unsettling it enough to let Robin nearly miss it with a blast of Arcthunder. The resulting shock terrified the horse and threw the General to the ground.

To his credit, the General rolled to his feet very quickly, bulky armor aside.

Chrom charges at the general with his rapier and Falchion ready, and the General readies his sword in return.

_Wait. This guy can't be the commander; nobody called for reinforcements, and none of the bodyguards panicked! _Robin suddenly thought, looking around wildly.

Chrom, meanwhile, was trading blows with the Plegian commander hit for hit, until Vaike circled around the general and jumped in with his axe.

The commander, too focused on his fight with Chrom (or, more accurately, Chrom was too loud and aggressive for the general to lose focus) felt the bite of an axe in his back, staggering a step as a result.

The slight loss of focus gave Chrom enough room to run the man through with his rapier, and then with a swift full circle turn and a mighty roar (and abandoning the rapier in the commander's wound), Chrom decapitated the enemy commander with a two-handed swing with his Falchion.

Chrom then looked around and realized that the focus of the Plegian men were elsewhere.

…

[1st person, Ash's thoughts]

…

Fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck

…

[3rd person camera]

…

The True Plegian General stood behind Ash, lance in hand and equipped with spectacularly embroidered heavy armor and an oversized tower shield.

"Uh…hi." Ash kicked his wind boots into gear and backpedaled fast, out of the General's way.

The roaring around the battlefield calmed a little, as both Plegia and Ylisse watched the General pace slowly towards the young man with weird things on his back floating on green shoes.

"Don't run, brat." The General growls. "Fight like a man."

"I Nerd, I don't Man." Ash grumbles, dropping his railgun onto the ground and unclipping the sword, carrying it over his shoulder with one arm like Hector's promoted sprite from Fire Emblem 7.

"A boy going into battle with a toy, how interesting." The General guffaws, "Show me what Ylisse is capable of."

With surprising speed for his bulk and equipment, the General charges at Ash, and Ash, in response, reorients his feet and zooms to the right of the General in a big circle, getting himself more distance between the two of them.

"C'mon, c'mon, fight like a man!" The Plegian troops jeer at Ash. "What's the matter, you Ylissean bastard!?"

…

[1st person camera, Ash]

…

Ok, ok. I can probably get in a single hit.

NO.

No.

I _need_ to get in a single hit. And I need to win so decisively it break Plegia's morale in one go.

OH GOD LANCE

_Right._

Zooming right.

"You certainly know how to run." The General's armor is really clanky…but given his speed he's either absurdly strong or the armor is very light.

Y'know what, fuck it.

If I die here then I was never good enough to fight Gangrel to begin with.

…

_You know what we have to do, right?_

…

I use my wind shoes to land a fair distance from the General, stepping on the ground.

"Ah…good." The General sounds like he's grinning. I can't see because of the distance and the fact that he's wearing a full face-covering helmet.

…

Deep breath.

Inhale.

The surrounding soldiers have fallen silent…they can tell something's going to happen.

Exhale.

…

Inhale.

This is the maiden voyage of this sword.

_You know what we have to do, right? As a man of science and anime._

We have a great sword weighing in at thirty pounds with a twin-serrated chainsaw edge and four jet propulsion systems.

It doesn't get much more anime than this.

_You know what you MUST do, right?_

…

My inner nerd won't forgive me if I don't.

Exhale.

Tap spell book.

…

[3rd Person Camera]

…

"Come, Ylisse!" The General roars and charges forward.

Ash takes a deep breath.

"Hissatsu!" He yells, and no one knows what the hell he just said.

"HAA!" The General charges faster and tightens his grip, preparing to run the smaller and stranger Ylissean man through.

"GIGA!" Ash activated his wind boots to max power, giving him charging power to counteract the weight of the sword. Ash then unshoulders the sword, and its edges pull apart with a whirr to reveal a pair of chains.

Ash charges forward, skating on his wind shoes.

…

[1st person camera]

…

_You know you're not using a drill, right?_

Uh

Uh

Uh

Improvising!

…

[3rd person camera]

…

"SWORD!" Ash yells as he flies toward the General, who at the moment is a little worried that the man he's facing against might be insane. The General's charge faltered just slightly when what looked like wings of fire protruded from Ash's back...but only slightly.

Four small bursts of fire appeared from the back of the blade's four nodes, accompanied by a high-pitched whine that nobody but Ash could hear.

The general reaches what he considers to be melee range. "FOOL!" He lunges with his lance, throwing all of his weight into his charge without even slowing down, not at all impressed by the dazzling (but ultimately useless) display of magic.

Ash jumps with his wind shoes, practically screaming the last word. "BREAK!" The propulsion from the sword's jets drives Ash off balance and sends him into a half circle spin, one that accelerated the blade right into the General's lance tip.

Moments before the sword made contact with the General's weapon, a third, louder whine came from the sword as the two chains moved at an absurd speed.

immediately, a loud shriek filled the air as the chains tore the lance tip to pieces and ate into the lance shaft.

In a moment of self-preservation and confusion, the General tightened his grip on his lance and raised his tower shield instinctively to protect himself.

And then Ash descended upon the enemy General, too adrenaline-dosed to register the fact that his sword was about to come into contact with a massive shield, or the fact that wood chips and steel shards were flying everywhere, some flying directly at him.

The sword could care less, and cut the shield in half with a shower of sparks and a loud metal-on-metal scream.

The sword then kept going, being propelled by both Ash's momentum and the jets on the back of the sword into the General's armor.

The General's face twisted then froze with pain and surprise as the Sword cut through his armor as if it didn't even exist and messily cleaved the man in half.

Ash, unused to the propulsion's force, let the sword drag him out further after it has exited the man on the other side, spinning quite a few times on the wind shoes before he managed to turn off the jets and stop his spinning, all the while showering the surrounding grass with specks of blood, wood, metal, and guts.

However, the eyes of the observing Plegian soldiers were focused on their General, and the fact that his upper and lower halves were separated from each other, with blood, viscera, and body parts flowing freely out of the corpse pieces with soft, slimy plops.

_Imagine a hot pocket spewing lungs and guts and intestines and blood._

…

[1st person camera]

…

I will not turn around, I will not turn around, I will not turn around…

_Maybe he's not dead?_

…

[3rd person camera]

…

Sensing a change in the Plegian troop morale, Robin and the two nobles ordered all units to attack the stunned Plegian cavalry. With the advantage of surprise and no longer fearing the danger of retaliation (if only for a moment) most of the Plegian Great Knights were dragged off their horses and beaten to death. The rest, having recovered sufficiently from seeing their General bisected by a skinny guy with a weird-ass sword, decided to call it a day and ran back towards Plegia.

…

…

"By the Gods, what happened to him?" Chrom asked softly, surveying the grisly remains of the enemy General.

"He did it." The closest villager said, pointing to Ash, who seemed to be having a minor panic attack.

…

[1st person camera]

…

I turned around.

_You knew it would happen._

I know. Doesn't make it easier to stomach though.

_Maybe you can borrow the one from the dead guy._

Man. Nothing kills a nerd high faster than reality.

"Ash." I hear Chrom say softly behind me.

"Yeah?" I don't turn around.

"Did you…build that weapon to do that?" I don't have to ask what he's referring to.

"Not…not that specifically. This is an anti-weapon weapon. I built it to destroy equipment." It's supposed to disarm, it's supposed to disarm...

"And yet…" Chrom isn't really accusing, mind; he's just really worried.

"Yeah, I know." I sigh. "I don't have good control over it yet." I shake my head. "It's..."

He claps me on the shoulder. "I trust you. Your action helped give us our victory, and saved a lot of Ylissean lives in the process."

Saved.

Of the two thousand men in the army we're lucky to have even half of them alive, and all for what, 70, 80 Great Knight kills?

_Not just that. If you count enemy archer/mage troop kills we have around 120._

As far as I saw most of the dead Ylisseans were the professional rank and file troops. This army has essentially lost all of its staying power in a sustained battle.

I guess Plegia wins this one?

_Not necessarily._

Ugh.

...

Enough!

I wake-up slap myself for motivation.

Enough moping. I made a weapon for the purpose of destroying equipment much sturdier than a human. I knew full well its expected magnitude of damage if I used it on a living human. If I regret being able to kill a man so easily, then all I have to do is to train until I can't kill a man accidentally with it in the future.

"Robin!" I get Robin's attention.

"What?" She turns around.

I go up to her. "What do you think about their, uh…" I motion to the nobles.

_Can't help but notice Robin pull away from you when you went up to her._

"I think they should pack up and go home." Robin says tiredly. "An army of villagers is just a bunch of walking corpses." She winces. "Damn."

Robin feels responsible as the tactician…

And any Fire Emblem tactician that has more than one death to their name is a bad one.

_And Robin has like a thousand deaths right now._

At the moment, I'm probably the last person to try and talk some optimism into her.

"You did good today." That just came out of my mouth. That just _seriously _came out of my mouth.

Robin shakes her head. I hope it's with exasperation.

I'm gonna go die of embarrassment now. 'scuse me.

_Nerd boy. Makes super powered chain greatsword._

Can't sweet talk women. Yeah, yeah...

…

…

[Night]

…

…

So, we made camp about…an hour's travel from the battleground. The two nobles sent messengers back to their territory, something about "retrieval", so I guess they're going to come back with carts or people to clean up the corpses.

On one hand, we succeeded in our mission. Plegia isn't going to be invaded by a ramshackle Ylissean army.

On the other hand…we now have a more ramshackle army. A ramshackle army with horrible morale.

Once the dust settled and the remaining alive soldiers did a head count, most of the idealistic "we will win against evil" bullshit died out in a real hurry. Now everyone of the villagers just wants to go home.

Sheesh.

Ricken's looking over my shoulder. "So…that's your sword." He says as I do maintenance.

"Yeah." I sigh. "It's pretty good at what it does."

"So I've heard." Ricken sounds distinctly uncomfortable. Fire Emblem swords are sharp and cutting, but, y'know, not…"cut through three layers of steel like butter" sharp.

_Three layers of steel, one layer of body, and some bones._

"How is it made?" Ricken can't help his curiosity sometimes.

I move it closer to the fire.

"See these?" I indicate to the blades, which I just replaced with new ones.

"They're like…disks." He says, gently touching one. "Hey…they're not sharp at all! Is it like the Falchion?"

If memory serves the Falchion works by blood identification...at least in terms of plot.

Uh… "Their sharpness comes from movement." So no, Ricken.

The blade of the sword is essentially a pseudo-chainsaw chain: it's a series of flat, rectangular-shaped washers (spigots, disks with holes in them, whatever) interconnected with relatively thick pegs. The blade itself doesn't rotate, but the chain does. The fact that the chain segments were made quickly and without much concern for shape means they accidentally have teeth.

_"Flat" is also a bit of a misnomer. The blade chain pieces are all around 15 centimeters, give or take._

"So…where does the movement come from?"

I tap the large centerpiece at the base. "From here." I can't really open it up, since it's full of spirit dust and I don't think Ricken is worth two and a half thousand gold. "It's a wind based" …turbine? They don't know what turbine is. "system."

"Oh really?" Miriel has come to see. Weapons are, in the end, a fact of life for people here. Plus she's just really inquisitive.

"The closed circle spell paper in here" I tap the base again "Casts a wind spell that gets collected by the small space of the centerpiece" The centerpiece has a cross section of like…half an inch or so (a little over a centimeter). "and then turns" _God this is hard to describe without using the word turbine_ "windmills nested up here." I tap the rest of the centerpiece. "That gives the blade the rotation it needs."

I hope they understood that sentence despite all the momentary pausing I did.

_In other words, the wind spell gets pressurized due to the small, enclosed space of the centerpiece to turn a set of turbines which, in turn, power the chains. During the design phase we were worried that the wind spell won't have enough power._

And I, once again, underestimated just how ridiculously powerful the spells are when you repurpose them to an irregular job. The blade rotation was way faster than I thought it was.

"A closed circle spell? Whatever does that mean?" Miriel adjusts her glasses. I think there's some meaning behind that action.

"It means the spells used in the blade doesn't depend on my magical power to activate. Like my long range weapon, this sword has a deposit of spirit dust inside it to act as a catalyst." Technically it has multiple deposits of spirit dust, since the paper need to have physical contact with the catalyst to activate.

"Catalyst?" Miriel frowns slightly.

"Material used for a reaction, for example…wood is a catalyst for a fire." I'm pretty sure this isn't the strict definition of what catalyst means.

"You said 'spells'." Ricken's been leaning left and right, trying to get a good idea of what this weapon looks like from every angle.

Oh yeah.

"This thing runs on four types of spells." I tap the hilt. "The hilt contains the first activation circle; I need to use that if I want to use the sword at all. The second one is the rotational spell that gives the sword its cutting edge. The third is…this." I wave Ricken and Miriel's hand away from the sword, just in case I mess it up and accidentally cause a horrible machinery accident.

Lessee…a little power here, and…

With a whirr, the two covering edges move slowly back over the chains, reforming their vaguely solid blade-like look.

"Whoa." Ricken has this little boyish smile on his face. I had the same one when I pieced this thing together.

_You have one on your face right now._

"Cool, right? These covers are hard enough to sustain a few hits and protect the chains from damage."

"So what's the fourth spell?" Nino came over too.

I hold the weapon blade-up. Let's…just activate the first engine. It comes alive with a whine (which surprises the other mages present) and runs for a few seconds before coughing and dying.

But I got the point across, so I turn the weapon around and point to the four little holes on the back.

"These four are the same spell; they're jet engines."

"Jet?"

"Engine?" By now I've caught almost all of the attention of the Shepherds. I feel badass.

_Nerdly badass._

"It…"

It's essentially a super simplified version of the jet engines used on commercial airliners.

"Air that comes in from here" I turn the weapon around again, pointing to the pair of openings with each jet engine output that act as air intakes "gets heated by the fire spell within the engines, and then gets pushed out of this end." I tap the jet outputs. "It gives me the momentum I need to actually swing the sword." Thank you Kerbal Space Program for teaching me the fundamental basics about how jet engines work.

"But why did it fail moments after you activated it?" Miriel asks.

"No air." I shrug. "It needs air to work." The main difference is I don't have something like a circular air intake because I'm fairly sure there is no blacksmith in this world capable of making something like that, The Fire spell only heats and pushes the air out, and the rate of push-out is a lot higher than the natural rate of air intake, unless the weapon is moving.

"This weapon…" Robin cocks her head. "Sounds very impractical."

I laugh.

"It's kind of the anti-Falchion; very fragile and good for only highly specific situations. I need to maintain and repair it after every fight and I can only use it in those specific situations." I pat my surplus parts bag. "Take today, for example: I went overboard and ended up breaking two of the chains." Technically only a chain and a half broke, but I don't feel like trying to pry open the fasteners holding the chain together with my bare hands.

"That's why you have all those spare equipment?" Maribelle asks with a raised eyebrow.

"Yep." I plan to use this weapon on Gangrel and break his Levin Sword. That's literally the only reason why I built this thing. Afterwards I'll maybe consider building a type two that's light enough to mount on one arm and do the same thing.

"Is this a culmination of your knowledge as an Outsider?"

…

Miriel asked that one.

If it was anyone else.

If it was ANYONE else.

"It's…part of it." I finally say.

She smiles. "Fascinating." I uh...I know she's just interested in information, but uh...

…

I…I need an adult?

_You are an adult._

_._

_._

_._

{ === + === }

The explanation behind the sword is pretty accurate to how I envisioned it.

Exception being the chain compartments. It took me a while to figure out how it could reasonably be made, for a given definition of reasonable.

And for the record: Ash's Romaji is supposed to be inaccurate, in the sense that as a native english speaker/weeaboo, he's more used to pronouncing loan words in English than in Japanese. If you know what that means good for you, if you don't...don't worry about it. And yes this is a self-insert fic.

Also, I have never been more disappointed that I do not know how to build a drill.


	12. From - A Camp

"Yo, you ok down there, Ash?"

"I think I am ok." I groan. "Help me up, Stahl."

He gives me a hand and drags me back up to sitting position.

"What happened?" Stahl asks, looking back and forth between me and my…what should I call it?

_It's a chain greatsword, so just call it that._

He's looking at the chain greatsword embedded into the ground with one of its jet ports smoking.

"I made a little mistake during maintenance." Ugh. Still hurts to talk.

"How?" Stahl scratches his head.

Well…

"You know how spells explode when they hit each other?" I look around for the rouge jet emitter.

"Yes?" Stahl nods slowly.

"Well my sword uses a lot of spells, and if I mess up with my containment they hit each other." Ah ha, there it is.

"Um…"

I get up and pick the rogue jet up. "In a nutshell, a wind spell hit a fire spell and shot this jet at me." Good thing I caught the issue before going into a second battle with it, or that would've been really embarrassing.

Let's see…the jet seems to be fine, but given the circumstances I might as well replace it with a new one.

"I uh…I see. Good luck with the rest of your maintenance." Stahl then leaves to do…whatever he was going to do.

_That's how it's been for the past two days actually…nobody wants to hold a conversation with us for more than five minutes._

I wonder why.

Ok, the new jet is ready…but I need to find out why it blew up in my face last time.

So let's pop this part off here…ok, yeah, the metal section joining the jet mount and the rotor part is bent.

In retrospect I'm glad it didn't explode violently.

So how do I fix this?

I wish I had duct tape at this point. I have paper, so…let's wrap it around the jet, and…there we go.

Hm…commencing testing.

Routing magical energy…spooling rotors…

_The main rotor hums softly, gradually increasing in volume until it's at a fairly loud roar, lasting for about fifteen seconds before we stopped channeling power._

Ok, we're good. I don't know for how long this fix will last, but we're good.

…

So I mentioned that we were here for the past two days.

"Here" being the closest town to the pass that Ylisse just got demolished in.

Robin had a "hunch" and essentially told the Shepherds to stay put while we sent messengers back to Emmeryn for new orders, Amelia being the messenger.

Actually, Amelia and Cordelia.

I suggested that Cordelia get sent on the messenger mission.

I'm also preparing to fortify my tent against possible hostile intrusion once she comes back.

_The two incidents are in no way related to each other. Nope, no way, definitely not._

Truth be told Sumia has been making her move on Chrom, and, to be honest, letting Cordelia stay near Chrom won't actually accomplish anything, since the awkwardness that renders her catatonic near Chrom is, if anything, downplayed in the games.

Seriously if she gets within ten feet of Chrom she starts shaking uncontrollably.

Also, and I feel that this is the right time to mention it: Sumia's clumsy trait is more likely to appear the closer she is to food. It probably is just a balance problem when it comes to trays of food though.

_We've been doing a lot of people watching for the past two days._

Either that or maintenance and spell training; I still need to be able to cast spells like a traditional mage, after all. Although, compared to the other mages my spell power is easily the lowest.

_It goes: Robin, Nino, Miriel, Ricken, us._

It makes a lot of sense, really. Robin's the vessel for Grima, Nino's got special blood or something, Miriel's very analytical and puts a lot of time to her spell practice. Ricken dicks around and we spend all our time working on tools.

Chrom has spent the past two days largely in Sumia's grasp. I don't know what they're doing and frankly I don't really want to find out, but given that he usually seems confused while she seems happy I don't think they're doing anything porny.

Oh, that reminds me. Panne technically joined the group some time after the assassination attempt, but she only showed up yesterday. Makes me think that the whole "last of the taguel" is a bit of an exaggeration, which is always nice.

_If she really was the "Last of the Taguel" then the Taguel would die out really damn fast._

Yeah. Panne's more of a bunny-ears thief than a killer bunny though, but then again I haven't seen her fight yet so it's hard to tell. She wears a knife on her belt, which is why I'm guess she's a thief.

…

So…

Fate has been pretty kind about forcing us on the game-storyline track so far, at least in terms of not killing named characters.

I mean, Donnel came really close to dying (he's still bedridden at the moment) but he pulled through thanks to Lissa's spellwork.

Gaius also came really close to dying but that's because he stole and put one of my jets in his mouth and it activated somehow. He's also ok thanks to Lissa's spellwork.

In other news I am now "Tricky" because I tricked him or something.

The name isn't sticking, as far as I can see.

"YO!" Vaike's volume setting is permanently stuck to "loud", and he claps me on the shoulder. "Spacing out again?"

I'm sitting at a table staring out a window. "I guess. What's up?"

"I was gonna ask you that!" Vaike laughs, taking a seat. "Chrom's been pretty distant lately."

Having a girl would do that, I guess? "You know about as much as I do." I shrug.

He laughs. "That's not it." He then goes into serious mode. Serious mode Vaike is a little off-putting. "Robin told me you know more than you say. What do you think Plegia is doing right now?"

Robin, why you do this to me. "Robin lied to you. I have no idea what Plegia is doing…I have guesses though."

"Great, let's hear it."

Er…I actually don't have guesses; I just said that as a reflex.

"Well…" I fiddle with the greatsword. "It won't surprise me if Plegia is planning another attack."

"Duh." Hearing that from Vaike and seeing him roll his eyes is _weird._ "We're at war, of course they're going to attack! Where do you think they'll hit?"

…

"Themis? They snuck a pretty large force across the border last time." Come to think of it, it's entirely possible they're going to attack from Themis.

"Can't get Maribelle off your mind, huh?" Vaike grins.

I actually haven't seen Maribelle at all for the past two days.

…

Both of us then look around when we hear one hell of a shriek.

"Was that Robin?" Vaike frowns. "That was really loud."

Is this the Robin-Chrom B support?

_Why is their support a clichéd rom-com anyways?_

"Sounded like it." I say, and Vaike jumps to his feet with a cackle.

I'm not getting involved in this crap.

…

That being said, I do need a breather since my maintenance is finished. Hmm…

Or…I can witness Robin in what I think is a bathrobe chase Vaike down with a sparks coming out of her hands.

It's been fifteen seconds.

How does he go from "bystander" to "guilty" in less than a minute?

"I regret nothing!" Vaike laughs as he bolts through the room.

Robin is just…raging. Really hard, followed by a very sheepish Chrom.

"What happened?" I ask him.

"I uh…may have walked upon her bathing." Chrom mumbles guiltily.

"YOU." Robin points to me and I stand at attention because fuck is she terrifying right now. "You see nothing."

"Yes ma'am." Do not argue with the vessel of a god.

She nods and continues charging after Vaike.

I most definitely did not see her robe thingy flutter just a tad too high. Nope. Not a thing.

_We must be delusional._

"Ash." Chrom says after we have a minute of stunned silence. "How are you holding up?"

"Uh…I'm doing pretty good." I don't like small-talk very much…part of being naturally introverted I suppose. "I'm finished with my maintenance so I'm ready to go once we get our next orders."

He looks at me oddly. "You think we're going to go into another battle?"

I shrug. "Plegia doesn't strike me as a patient country."

"Oh, right." Chrom snaps his fingers. "Sumia wanted to ask you: why did you send Cordelia with Amelia?"

Real reason? "Because I'm worried that a lone messenger would just be intercepted." I didn't think about the whole relationships business until after I made my suggestion.

"Hm." Chrom smiles a little. "I see."

…

What was that all about?

…

…

…

So Robin ran through the entire camp nearly naked.

And the entire camp has agreed that it has never happened, no sir.

Except Fredrick drew the "We want you!" Naked Chrom posters from this little incident and indeed they are all around the camp.

_For those of you wondering: the Shepherds have borrowed the edge of town and a fallow farm field as its temporary camping grounds. The village is pretty busy for this time and there wasn't any room at the inns._

God knows why.

Also, Lissa saw those posters and nearly hurt herself laughing.

In a rare stroke of fortune, the painting had a bit of convenient censorship with the Falchion covering Chrom's manliness…which is good, since for some ungodly reason Miriel kept one of the posters and was noticeably disappointed when she realized that fact.

It's good because I'm not entirely sure I want Lissa asking uncomfortable questions.

_To be fair she's technically of age so I think she would've gotten the birds and bees talk by now._

I think so too, but it doesn't make it any less comforting.

…

[Day later]

…

Amelia and Cordelia came back this morning, about…two hours ago?

They look a little worn-out but otherwise ok.

Cordelia also tried to kill me with a glare before Miriel gave her the Chrom poster she kept hidden from his anti-poster rampage.

I'll need to thank her later.

_Possibly the most terrifying thing I think I've ever decided to do._

We're not giving Miriel a good name, are we?

"Sir, report." Amelia says with a salute, since Cordelia took one look at Chrom's face and melted. "Plegia has launched a full scale assault on Ylisse from the southern border."

_Parsing…_

Chrom jumps to his feet. "What?! Is my sister ok?!"

"She is leading the defense of the city, and gave the Shepherds a new order." Amelia says, calm as all hell.

"If it isn't 'head by to Ylisse' I'm not following it." Chrom growls.

Amelia shakes her head. "It isn't, sir. The Exalt's orders are to enter Plegian territory and remove the cause of the war."

Am I hearing that right?

"Like the dog he is." Amelia adds with a feral grin upon catching my eye.

"Wow, Emmeryn. I didn't expect that from her." I mutter with a smile and a shake of my head.

"Wait, what did Emm mean?" Lissa stares at Amelia, wide-eyed.

"She wants us to go find Gangrel and end his sorry life." I say with a wide smile.

Chrom looks indecisive. His desire to tear Gangrel piece to piece is fighting with his desire to see Emmeryn safe.

"Robin?" I look at Robin, who has…swapped out of her black-purple tactician robe in favor of a uniformly dull white cloak. It's really pretty, actually.

Robin nods and rolls out a map. "Chrom, we're going to head into Ferox and petition them for reinforcements to Ylisse." She points to the map. "And then we're going to swing north around Plegia and cut downwards."

"But…" Chrom values his family very highly.

"I know; from what I've heard about Gangrel, he won't be waiting in his castle." Robin says. "So we're going to strike down and cut his army's supply line while our Pegasus knights search for the center of military activity."

I frown. "And that's where he is?" This seems like a pretty ramshackle plan.

Robin shrugs. "It should be."

Yikes.

"I still don't like this." Chrom folds his arms.

"I don't either." Robin plays with a strand of her silvery white hair. "But it's a matter of time for Emmeryn; Ylisstol's defenses can't hold out forever."

"Right." Chrom takes one hell of a deep breath. "Fredrick, alert all shepherds. We're leaving for Ferox immediately."

…

…

…

"How did you know we were going to Ferox?" I ask Robin.

"What made you think I knew?" Robin says slyly.

"You blend in to the Ferox snow really well with that cloak, and I know you don't do coincidences."

She does; her hair's white, her cloak's white-ish, if she put her hood on and turned away from me she'll disappear.

_Technically she still does show up against the trees, and the parts of the ground that isn't snow..._

Well, yeah.

"I didn't think Plegia moved their heavy cavalry to the border just for kicks, you know." Robin says. "Their land is largely barren, and they have pretty poor supply lines; if they move something as resource-heavy as Great Knights to the borders then they're bound to use them."

Huh.

"Great Knights are really that expensive?" I ask.

"The horses are; Great Knights have special breed horses that can carry all that armor and still charge at speed, after all." Robin adjusts her coat. "Add on the difficulty of maintaining their barding and, well…they're suited for either one of two things. Town defense or all-out attacks, and I'm pretty sure Plegia wasn't trying to protect a town."

_Hmm...I suppose if we need long distance patrol coverage cavaliers and paladins would be better._

I never saw Fredrick do any maintenance on his horse's armor though.

"Oh, Fredrick?" Robin says when I mention that fact. "Ylissean horse barding is different; the front armor is made piecemeal for easier maintenance, since that armor takes more punishment. In return it's thinner and can't take as much damage though…but Fredrick got a replacement set of barding at the last town."

Which was the one we camped in for a few days. Got it.

"Is there a way for you to make armor that's lighter and stronger for us?" Robin asks. Judging by her body language that was a question made on impulse.

Well…uh. "The armor types I know are better against projectile weapons instead of cutting ones." I don't know how to make Kevlar and I don't think Chobam armor is manufacturable, even if I figured out a way to spoof it.

"Damn." Robin snaps her fingers.

Well…I'll think of something.

…

…

…

Except thinking is a hard thing to do while travelling on a fairly loud wagon and being cuddled by Nino because she's cold. Since we didn't start from Ylisstol our path travels through more of Ferox than Ylisse, all because Chrom wanted a straight path from A to B.

"I don't like Ferox." Nino grumbles, huddling in her oversized travelling coat.

"Bern was never this cold?" I'm pretty sure Fire Emblem 7 had a snow map.

"Not if we can help it." She mutters.

…Granted she's wearing pretty little, I think she's wearing three layers and one of them is her armor.

I'm packing at least like five layers at this point.

_Four. You gave her your coat._

Oh yeah.

I pet her head.

…

Mercifully, the trip so far has been smooth (if hurried) sailing, with no Risen in sight.

Chrom got us large, covered wagons that both house supplies and Shepherds, except the ones that are better on horseback.

I'm sharing the wagon with Nino, Maribelle, Virion, and a metric ton of arrows.

It doesn't make for good resting, but I guess Maribelle's on deck to help prevent whatever unpleasantries may happen.

For the record, Maribelle and Virion are actually on fairly polite terms (which for Maribelle is an enormous step forward) and are discussing the future of Themis in very hushed tones.

_It is her homeland._

Yeah…makes me wonder if she'll have anything to go back to once Plegia gives up.

Maribelle sighs, and then turns to look at me with one of the saddest expressions I think I've ever seen. "Ash, what do you think? About my home?"

I catch Virion making something like an "Oh well" shrug.

Truth sucks, I guess? "I…I think Themis will be lucky if it doesn't get burned to the ground after this."

Maribelle sighs. "You think so too, huh…" She seems to resist the urge to hit something. "What is the rest of Ylisse doing? Where are the bloodthirsty bastards when you need them?!"

Nino flinches but doesn't say anything.

_Her reaction implies that she doesn't know about her bloodline yet._

She's Sonia's adopted bastard daughter...I can see how that would be bad for a relatively medieval time frame.

"Now, now, Milady." Virion says soothingly. "We have to consider the possibility that the bloodthirsty nobility are merely horrible liars."

Liars?

_Lying about wanting to go to battle or lying about having troops to begin with. Take your pick._

Posturing asshats.

_Also Virion might have noticed Nino's little flinch if his word choice is any indication._

Hm. He probably did.

I hear a whistle, and Maribelle opens a small front shutter to look outside.

"Robin just told us to stop." Maribelle says, closing the shutter and leaning back against the wagon's…what do you call them, walls?

"Let's see what the lady has in store for us!" Virion jumps off the wagon from the back.

…

Maribelle doesn't want to move, I don't want to move, Nino doesn't want to move…

Thanks for volunteering, Virion.

…

Virion comes back a moment later. "Ash! Robin's asking for you."

Huh.

Well, let's see.

…

Nino, please let go of my arm so I can do things

…

Robin's standing next to a tree, peering into the distance.

I'm really glad it isn't snowing, just stupid cold.

_We're really glad we're not driving a car, too._

Fuck icy roads.

"What's up?" I ask Robin as I get closer.

Robin points in front. Let's see…it's a yellow blob, I think. A yellow blob is trying to get into a house on the side of the road, with wide open fields of nothing but white on either side.

_Pity the forest cover ends at this point I guess._

If she's worried about then it's probably an enemy. So what's yellow?

_An Entombed._

"I don't want to risk running the caravan through and we're short on time. Can you take care of it?" Robin asks.

…

Wouldn't devoting all of our resources to killing it make it go faster?

_No, no it wouldn't. Look around some more._

Let's see…to the left and right, in the fields…specks?

"Are there more Risen hidden in the fields?" I ask her.

"I'm assuming yes. Hurry it up, will you? It's too damned cold here." Robin stomps her feet.

One long range snipe shot, coming right up.

_Fvoom~ The blob got smaller, so it might have been a hit. It's too far to see and the snow is too blinding._

"I think I got him."

"Great. Hop onto the front of the lead wagon just in case." Robin says quickly and nearly runs back to said lead wagon.

…

So we hurry across, and…yeah, I barely hit the Entombed. It's on the ground and its eyes aren't glowing anymore, but it hasn't poofed, so I'm not quite sure what's going on with it.

Also, wagons are loud. Wagons on stone is really damn loud.

Wagons on stone with a coating of snow is comparatively less loud.

Still loud enough to wake the hibernating dead. Holy shit, man.

Basilio, Flavia, you guys dropped a ball somewhere.

"Unbelievable." Robin shakes her head. She's sitting behind me under the relatively warmer cover of the wagon...covering.

"I know, right?" I laugh. I can't do anything because fuck my hands are frozen and I can't really aim while the wagon is bouncing around like this.

So we just ran our wagons through the road that's getting progressively more congested by Risen while Fredrick, Sully and Stahl plow the way.

…

…

…

Ferox. Finally, Ferox.

I see a fire. "You guys seem to have a bit of a Risen issue." I'm so happy that fire is a thing that exists.

Nino curled up next to it like a cat. I think she's half asleep at this point.

"We know. The weather keeps them in check though." One of the guards shrug. "Khan Flavia's been busy putting an army together."

Really?

"Why?" I ask the guard.

"Don't know; doesn't bother me though. I have a safe and warm job as a guard." He grins.

Hmm…I guess she knew about Plegia's invasion already?

"Chrom, we should hurry." Robin says.

Chrom nods. "Right."

…

He just strode off to where Flavia's court is.

Isn't there usually something…I dunno, more diplomatic that needs to happen first?

_It's Chrom._

…

I hate how that's actually an effective argument.

…

"Ah, Chrom! It's been a while. What brings you here?" Flavia says with a broad smile. Her smile then falls when she sees Chrom's face. "What happened?"

"Plegia has launched a full scale invasion; they're attacking Ylisstol as we speak." Chrom snarls.

Flavia scowls. "Damn, that came a lot sooner than I expected." She then looks at Robin. "I take it you have a plan?"

Robin nods. "We're here to request Feroxi aid against Plegia on the main front. The Shepherds will strike at Plegia's core and eliminate Gangrel while their main force is occupied."

"You're asking us to handle the heavy lifting, mind you." Flavia says with a raised eyebrow.

"I am aware." Robin bows (a little apologetically, I think).

"Heh. Excellent; my troops will be ready by tomorrow. What about you, Basilio?" Flavia nearly shouts the last question.

"Same for us." Basilio shows up from around the corner. "It's getting bad, huh, prince?"

Chrom nods. "Your assistance is greatly appreciated."

Basilio waves it away. "Pah! We knew Plegia was going to try something; it was just a matter of time. Besides, you guys have the tough job." He thinks for a little, and then snaps his fingers. "Olivia!"

…

…

Uh…

Wow.

She's…pink long hair, tied up, a not-frostbite-inviting outfit that's pretty form fitting anyway, pants that aren't ungodly poofy, and…

Holy double shit she actually, literally sparkles.

Like, they emanate from her body and glow and flutter and shit.

Olivia is…a lot, I mean, a _lot _prettier than the game's art.

"You called for me, Sir Basilio?" Buuut she's still a shrinking violet. Her voice is closer to the Japanese one.

"Yep. I want you to go help the Shepherds." Basilio says, clapping the comparatively tiny girl on the back.

"Eh? B-but…" Olivia shrinks and blushes so damn hard.

_I want to see a blush-off between her and Cordelia._

…what does that even mean?

"It will be a pleasure to have you." Chrom's…affected. By Olivia. To say the least.

Sumia and Cordelia are evidently not all too happy about it, if the sudden temperature drop in the room is any indication.

I feel a tug on my sleeve. "Is she a dancer?" Nino asks me.

How did she…? "Yeah, I think she is." I say out of the corner of my mouth.

"We-well, Sir Chrom, it'll be an honor to work with you, uh…" Olivia hastily bows-slash-curtseys.

And then she sees Lon'qu, who gives her a relatively cheery wave, complete with a small smile.

_For Lon'qu that's like…I don't even know._

"Lon'qu! Hi~" Olivia waves right back, all traces of nervousness gone. I also think seeing Olivia has given literally every male in attendance a boner…except maybe Ricken, but that might be because the kid is on the verge of hyperventilating.

Ok, correction.

Seeing Olivia smile has given every man and woman in vision range a reaction of some sorts.

_If we can weaponize her smile we could end every war forever._

Lon'qu and Olivia separate from the group and look for all intents and purposes like reunited lovers. Even if the only things they're really talking about is swordplay…apparently she's learning from him. Did not know that.

I glance over at Lissa and see her pout.

She sees me looking and pouts harder.

"Ha…no wonder throwing figs at him didn't work that well." Robin says, looking at the relaxed Lon'qu with a faint smile.

"You did what now?" I ask her.

_C rank support, I think._

I know, but still.

"He wanted my help getting rid of his Gynophobia." Robin says, and then shrugs.

I'm still not entirely sure how Robin came to the answer of "pelt him with fruit".

_Maybe that's her answer for all phobias._

It…would certainly work for some of them, come to think of it.

"I…see. I guess." I don't know, I don't want to know. "Looks like he didn't really need our help?"

Robin smirks. "Well, you never know."

…

Olivia is actually fast.

For whatever reason Lon'qu and Olivia decided to have a small tussle right then and there.

She's faster than Lon'qu. Like…it should not be physically possible to be that fast.

_They had a practice spar with their swords still in their sheaths, and Olivia grabbed Lon'qu sword arm and twisted, making him (purposefully) drop his sword._

Like, I need my wind shoes to kind of be that fast, and even I don't have that agility.

Robin watched their exchange. "Wow, she's a gem alright." She mutters to herself.

"Must be the sparkles." I sigh.

She glances at me. "I'm sorry, what?"

"Sparkles? It looks like she's got glitter coming out of her." I say, restraining myself from pointing.

"Really now." Robin takes out her notebook and starts scribbling.

I frown. "So you can't see them."

"Nope."

Yay?

…

One key difference between Olivia and Lon'qu though: Lon'qu is naturally tactiturn and doesn't bother trying to talk to people, even when he first joined up.

Olivia on the other hand is a nervous wreck while trying to introduce herself to everybody in the Shepherds.

At this point I think her blush is permanent.

_It's the performer instinct that lets her try and talk to everyone, I suppose?_

Probably.

…

"Um… E-excuse me!" Olivia comes up to me and does her weird half-bow half curtsey. "L-lady Robin said that you…um…"

"That I see you sparkle?"

She nods furiously.

Uh…hm. "I don't know why I see it but she doesn't; do you know that you sparkle?"

She blushes and doesn't say anything, but nods very slightly after a little while.

Well, that's good then. I don't feel utterly weirded out now.

…

_Right now, two rather introverted people staring around at everything EXCEPT each other with no idea what to say._

Yeah, wow, this is kind of painful. Uh…find topic, find topic… "How long have you been learning from Lon'qu?"

"Eh? Uh… Ever since he came to Ferox, I think…" She fiddles with her gloves.

I have to admit I'm looking forward to seeing her in her dancer outfit.

_Who isn't?_

…

Ok this interaction is painfully crashing and burning.

"I think you can tell we're both not very good conversationalists." I sigh.

She giggles. "I'll go bother someone else then, excuse me!"

_Yeah, she could tell._

…

…

While I was distracted with Olivia, Chrom and Robin apparently made some preparations according to Flavia's map of Ferox.

So we're actually going to have a plan instead of an outline, woo!

...

Except it's still an outline-y kind of plan.

Nothing really changes, except that Robin has pinpointed our route of entrance into Plegian territory.

Rather, she figured out where we should stay for the night before heading into Plegia because Plegia and Ferox essentially share what is one huge-ass border that is either desert or badlands. There's no road going in either direction because there are no resources usable in either direction for a least a few days.

_It took us a few days to get from Ylisstol to the Long Fort._

It did, but we were also travelling on a paved road. I don't think wagons will slog through sand at the same rate.

"Do we have enough supplies for the trip?" I ask Robin.

"As long as we restock there, we should be fine." Robin shrugs. "There" being the big town between Ferox and Plegia we're going to stop at.

…

…

And because Chrom is impatient we get to leave immediately.

Did I mention it's cold? I think I failed to mention that it's cold.

Vaike, the eternal bare-chest, dressed up. That's how cold it is.

Chrom I understand your concern for Emmeryn but we're not going to save her if we freeze to death.

…

…

At the very, very least, Chrom had enough sense to avoid driving us through the night.

Ferox nights are…actually really pretty. We can all stare at the beautiful, shimmering fields of snow while we all slowly die of hypothermia. It's great.

_We're just being assholes: Ferox is cold but not snowy all year round. Except for the area around the Long Fort the majority of the landscape we've seen is pretty snow-deprived._

Which means it's just cold and brown instead of cold and pretty.

The Long Fort is kind of the marker between snow!Ferox and brown!Ferox, it's a little strange.

"My word, Feroxi nights are as harsh as always." Virion grumbles.

"Then you've spent far too many nights in the walls of a castle." Lon'qu grunts.

The weather doesn't bother him or Olivia, to nobody's surprise.

_So what are we doing now?_

Carrying Nino the cat over to the fire. Seriously, all she needs is…

NEW MISSION IN LIFE. MAKE CAT EAR HAIRBANDS. HOLY SHIT WHY HAVE I IGNORED THIS FOR SO LONG

…

[Next day]

…

So I didn't sleep all that well, because of the cat-ear fueled adrenaline rush.

…

I need to find a cat and pet the hell out of it.

I miss my cat.

_You don't miss anyone else in your family or your extended family, just your cat._

Yes.

…

…

[Later]

…

…

Travelling…is dull, especially when nothing of interest happens on the road.

Nino eventually latched onto Maribelle and used her for warmth, which Maribelle interestingly enough had no objections to.

Robin swapped Virion out with Lissa, because, well…"I'm worried she's going to do something rash in her sleep." She says.

"I don't see how moving her to my wagon solves the problem."

Robin didn't give me an answer, which worries me.

On the other hand there's a Maribelle-Nino-Lissa cuddle crowd of adorableness, so I'm not complaining.

_Don't want to get in there yourself?_

Maribelle has been glaring daggers at me every time I looked in their general direction, so I'm going to assume I'll wake up with something missing if I tried.

What else, what else…

The fliers have been grounded; until now they've been in the air, flying alongside us. I don't quite understand why Robin grounded them; Cordelia's Pegasus refused to fly one day and Robin took that as a bad sign. They're now walking alongside the regular cavalry as a result.

On the plus side, it means I get to talk to Amelia again.

I mean, it's not like I had a lot to _say, _but I could if I chose to.

…

Regardless, we're actually at the border town in Robin's plan, and I gotta say…

Plegia land is a just strange.

I don't know if it's just my imagination or if the weather in Awakening is just that odd, but as we got closer to Plegian territory the temperature rose dramatically.

Not dramatically enough to go straight from "cold as hell" to "day at the beach", mind you, but dramatic enough to notice a significant difference.

Nino stopped being a cuddlebug due to the sudden temperature spike. Lissa is still a cuddlebug, although I think that's just because she likes Maribelle.

_Lissa/Maribelle fic incoming?_

I'm pretty sure those already exist by the dozen.

…

The town is walled, the wall seems to be well maintained, and the insides are…yeah, this is a pretty nice place. Compared to Maribelle's home town (the only place I can compare with) it feels a little more urban, though I think it might be a little smaller.

The buildings are generally well maintained and squished together, casting a bit of a shadow on the main road...which is good, since there's pretty much no clouds in sight. Plenty of people walk the streets, and some of them do stop and stare at the wagon train that just showed up at their doorstop, including some guards.

Olivia steps up and hands the guard something, and he nods and directs us to a large building complex attached to the wall...probably the barracks.

…

Robin gathered us around after we left our wagons within the town barracks. Olivia served as our messenger, which is rather nice of Basilio to think ahead like that.

"It'll take us a few days to get everything ready for our expedition." Expedition for assassination, I like it. "So until I issue the general rally, all of you are currently off duty; take the time to relax."

And get ready for the hell ahead.

"Your orders, not Chrom's?" Cordelia asks with narrowed eyes.

"Yes." Robin smiles at her. "Chrom is…a little too focused right now. I'm worried that he's going to get us all killed in the desert."

Chrom rolls his eyes…they probably had this conversation on the road. "As Robin says, take the time off, get yourselves properly rested and prepared. Our trip into Plegia will not be easy. Dismissed!"

…

Uh…

Hm.

_We can certainly take a look around. Up until now we've spent very little time actually relaxing._

If we were wound any tighter we'd snap? I certainly don't feel stressed.

_Wanna run that risk? Screw up a tiny bit and maybe hit one of the Shepherds with your railgun instead?_

…No.

…

At the same time I don't feel like streetwalking alone.

...

Ah, fuck.

_Do it._

But

_Do eeet_

But but

_YOUR SPINE COMMANDS YOU GODDAMMIT NOW DO IT. Don't live out the nerd fantasy!_

Where "she asks you out and you don't have to do anything."

Ugh.

I built a chain great sword, jumped into a lot of battles, faced off the root of all evil while being vastly outmatched.

And THIS scares me beyond everything else.

_You could be asking Miriel._

…

…

"Amelia."

She turns.

…This is utterly terrifying, wow.

"If you don't have any plans, feel like going around the town with me?"

.

.

.

{ === + === }

For once my self-imposed length limitation works for me! Ha ha!

_You had 12k words last chapter._

Shhh


	13. From - A Cliffhanger

_So, uh…in the future._

Yes.

_You might want to avoid…_

Asking a girl out within the hearing range of the entirety of the Shepherds.

_Yes._

Right.

…

_Immediately following our question the following things happened within a timespan of fifteen seconds:_

_Robin and Miriel, the dedicated note takers, whipped out their pocket notebooks and started taking notes at a stupidly fast pace._

_Olivia got really excited and wanted Lon'qu to celebrate with her for whatever reason but then their hands touched, so UST happened and she got really red, pretty standard stuff._

_Virion facepalmed._

_Lissa alternated between looking at Lon'qu, us, and pouting._

_Gaius took advantage of the change of focus and nicked something from one of the wagons…probably sweets._

_Sumia was absolutely overjoyed and stared intently at Chrom, who didn't seem to notice._

_There are others, but they're out of our line of sight, so we don't know what's going on with them._

_Of course, the active mind is too busy panicking the hell out of itself to actually register all of it though._

…

"Uh…sure?" _She sounded more confused than anything else._

AAAAAAAAAAAA SHE ACTUALLY AGREED AAAAAAA

_Oy_

PICNIC! PICNIC! AAAAAAAA

_Impressively we actually managed to maintain our poker face._

"Great. SO, uh… should I get you within an hour or so? Or…"

_Maybe you should calm down before someone gets hurt._

"I suppose so." Amelia says calmly.

…

She does know what this implies, right?

…

[Later]

…

"Yes, I know this is a kind of a date." Amelia sighed after I asked her once we were definitely out of Shepherd hearing range.

I don't really have a proper response. "Ok, cool."

"Did you think I didn't?" She asks with a sly smile.

Well… "Your reaction was pretty muted; I think a lot of people were disappointed."

She scratches her head. "I…wasn't really sure how to react, I guess. I don't get asked a lot."

Interesting.

We're both armor-less for this trip (since it will just draw undue attention), but we're still pretty attention getting anyway.

Without her armor, she's a little smaller, like…it's a little difficult to believe she's actually eighteen years old (or so) when she doesn't have her armor, eighteen years old and a professional soldier. She's also a little bit shorter than me, and I'm not exactly that tall to begin with.

_She's like…what, 1.7 meters tall…five and a half feet and a little bit extra._

In lieu of her armor, she's wearing what appears to be the GBA variant of the Fire Emblem Pegasus knight armor (which is essentially just a dress with a miniskirt) sans the armor parts.

_Though the skirt part is a bit longer and we're pretty sure we caught a glimpse of combat shorts underneath. Not that we were specifically checking or anything._

It's a little windy around here.

…

[5 minutes later]

…

Given the awkwardness that hangs around the air…

It is now incredibly obvious that both of us are married to our jobs.

We've been walking around one of the town center-ish areas without much of a direction in mind, and without much in the form of normal people conversation.

_In other words, small-talk._

I think we both knew this, since I caught her eye and we both immediately had the "wow this is lame" grin on our faces.

"Oh, good god, this is a trainwreck." I laugh.

"Apparently neither of us spends much time relaxing." She shakes her head.

To be honest, it's a load off my shoulders...the fact that we both have horribly low expectations of how well this is going to go.

"Welp. Since we're screwed this badly, how about…" I see what looks like a puppet theatre, being watched by a gaggle of small children and a few adults (probably their parents).

"Oh?" She follows my line of sight and sees it as well. "Ah…if I remember correctly, you're an Outrealmer, right? Are puppet shows a rarity in your world?"

We walk up to the puppet show.

Hmm…"I guess so; they're certainly not shown in towns anymore." Except during fairs and maybe school auditoriums.

_They're showing what seems to be a highly butchered version of events from one of the earlier Akaneia games._

Marth rescuing Maria, by the general gist of it.

"I heard this story a lot as a child." Amelia says, after we spend about a minute listening to the guy behind the veil try valiantly to be gallant one moment and girly the next. "Do you know of it?"

Uh…I played the stage, but "Wolf holding a staircase while Marth unlocks a door with a shield" is probably not the correct chain of events.

_God, how long ago was it now?_

"Well…I know the basics." I frown. "Maria was the headstrong princess of…that one place, wasn't she?"

"Really?" Amelia looks at me for a second. "That one place is Medon, Sir Ash."

"I'm bad with nation names."

"And yet you remember Plegia just fine."

Grr.

"In any case." Amelia's sly grin is very out of place on her Amelia-esque face. "Maria is the demure, polite princess who was taken captive, and Prince Marth, in a daring move, rescued her from the clutches of evil. Obviously…" She pauses as the man doing the play does an epic death yell, playing the part of a stage boss being shanked by Marth, to the delight of the children watching. "It's a little more involved than that, but that's the basics."

_Amelia-esque? What the hell, man?_

That narrative doesn't square away with my recollection of the stage at all. I guess this would be like a story being adapted to fit local morals and expectations? Because I remember Maria essentially forcing herself into the party and being a total badass (plot-wise) before I benched her because she's like the fifth healer or something.

"Well…it's no different from a lot of stories I've heard, I suppose." Amelia watches the man come out and bow to the cheers and claps of the children. "But it was the first story I heard as a child."

"It's a bit different from how I heard it." I murmur.

"Oh, really? Your world has stories like that?" She asks as we continue down the main road.

"Well…lots." Lots of them probably lost over the ages or buried in the internet.

"Even concerning King Marth?" Amelia's actually wide eyed when asking that question.

…Fucking landmines.

"Yeah…I think. I've heard of them but never read them." Evasive action! Evasive action!

"Interesting…sounds like your Outrealm is very advanced."

_Lol_

"It has its share of issues." I shrug.

Amelia takes that as a cue to not press the issue further.

…

We then get distracted by a pet store.

_We should also mention the fact that we're steadily wandering closer to the richer part of the town._

Right, right. The town is…a lot like a bunch of smaller towns knitted together. There are several town center-esque squares dotted around the town with major roads connecting all of them like a spider web, and the wealthiest part of the town is closest to the left wall, which is also where the barracks is…huh. Interesting.

The town sections themselves also differ from each other: the building around each town center suggests that the town was in fact built up pretty piecemeal, with the rightmost section of the town being built first (from what I could see buildings in those areas look shinier while the ones around us are more worn down).

_Isn't that backwards? We're in the newer part of town._

This town wasn't built overnight, so the shinier parts of the buildings on the right side is where their occupants made repairs to those buildings over the years, while the buildings on our side are worn down because they don't need to be replaced yet.

Either way it's an actual, honest to god store for selling household pets. It's open-air, likely to deal with the smell due to a lack of air conditioning, and…

Most of the pets available are dogs.

_So it's more of a pet store slash hunter's store than JUST a pet store, judging by the stall on the front of the complex selling bows and arrows._

I guess that would make more sense. Pets are technically a luxury good, after all.

"Oh my." Amelia bends down to pet one of the dogs that just tried to climb her legs.

I happen to be a cat person so this is a little disappointing. The fact that they only have medium to large-ish dogs around, I mean.

"Oh! Are you looking for a pet, dear lady?" The shop owner (probably) says. Amelia looks remarkably upper class in her almost-mini-skirt of a dress.

"Eh? Ah…I'm not in a position to at the moment." Amelia shakes her head.

The store owner laughs. "Really? Too bad. He seems to like you." The dog yips in agreement.

"It's not like we can take it on our march." Amelia murmurs.

"I didn't think we'd see a peasant here." I catch someone say behind me. I don't think anyone else heard him though.

"Ash, Ash." Amelia looks up at me with sparkly eyes. "Do you like dogs?" She says as she shows the dog she's hugging to me.

Ah…

"I have to admit I like cats better." I extend a hand to pet the dog and said dog licks it.

It feels so weird when the tongue doesn't feel like sandpaper.

Amelia cocks her head. "Why? Cats are not very useful."

"No, but they're certainly more adorable." I grin. God I miss my cat, the most beautiful tuxedo cat in the history of forever with the shiniest coat of fur.

_But that's just our opinion._

"Oh my…you're quite the pretty one, young lass." A guy says, bowing towards Amelia. I think it's the same guy that made the peasant comment earlier.

_He's fairly right: We stand out among all the visitors here. Most normal people just stop by to buy bows or arrows, while we're the only ones inside actually looking at dogs._

"And who might you be?" Amelia frowns, putting the dog down.

…Judging by his flinch he seems to hold himself in very high regard. "Ah, well. I am Sir John, of the most noblest house of Ferox."

_Most noblest, he says._

I share a look with Amelia. "I have no idea what that's supposed to mean." I say.

Judging by his physical reaction to me opening my mouth he was referring to me earlier.

_Surprised?_

…No, not really, but he gets credit for actually restraining his sense of self-importance to look better in front of Amelia.

"Ah, so you two are travelers…small wonder you have never heard of me."

Amelia puts down the dog.

"Then hear me!" He draws himself to his full height, and I think he's practiced this routine a lot of times before. "For I am—"

Amelia tugs on my arm.

…

…

So we left the guy reciting his introduction speech alone and went somewhere else.

I kind of feel bad, but then it's his fault for closing his eyes.

"Nobles like him are everywhere." Amelia…snarls?

"Don't like that kind of attention?" I frown.

"Not at all." She sighs. "Being a Pegasus Knight gets me away from the little misguided noble boys…though I guess that won't last for much longer."

Oh really? "Why's that?"

We stop in front of a shop with tables set outside…like a café.

"I am of noble blood, after all, and…" She takes a deep, deep breath. "And being a woman of noble birth means I need to at least consider marriage soon."

_Sounds like a pain in the ass…though I think it's the same across the aisle, come to think of it._

"How soon is soon?" I feel like I'm rushing into something here.

"Two years or so." Amelia shrugs, sitting down at a table. "I don't want to, if you haven't realized that already."

I kind of got that. Yeah.

"I want to become a Falcoknight. One that rivals The King's attendant in strength and speed." She says, looking at the sky.

_Do they stop being knights if they get married and have kids (as is the expectation)?_

Hmm…well, this was never intended to be a romantic date to begin with. "I think you're pretty close already." Caeda/Shiida had crappy strength.

"Thank you." Amelia looks around. "What do you dream of?"

Erm.

"Rather, as an Outrealmer…what are you trying to accomplish?" Amelia asks after she sees me frown.

"I'm here to try and kill a giant dragon." I sigh.

_This is one of the times where honesty's going to get us thrown into an asylum._

"I'm sorry?" Amelia stares at me as while the serving girls bring out something akin to like a lunch time treat or something.

_It's very herby, minty smelling. Also that small sign says the treat is like ten gold._

"Yeah. You know what we're going to do in Plegia, right?" I ask her.

She nods.

"Two years from then…at least two years from then, we're going to have a seriously huge death dragon on our hands."

Amelia looks at me with the "wow this guy is stupid" glazed look for a moment.

The she shakes her head.

_She didn't facepalm though._

"You are quite strange." She says, munching on the food.

"It's the truth." I do the same.

This is actually pretty good. It's like...I dunno, fluffy, fluffy bread with a little bit of mint and creamy goodness thrown in.

"So all those battles so far where you nearly died had to do with this massive dragon?" Amelia asks after we finished spontaneously eating…though to be fair it was close to lunchtime.

"Yeah; the mage we first met was a toss-up: I don't know who he worked for or what, but it's fair to say he was a Grimleal."

She frowns. "And the assassination…"

"…was an attempt to pave the way for summoning the dragon, I think." I look up and see Amelia's eye widen.

"Plegia is trying to summon Grima again." She says a little breathlessly.

…

Wait.

_Again?_

"Again?"

She nods. "Supposedly, Plegia tried summoning Grima some fifty years ago."

And this is the first time anyone has mentioned it?!

"The attempt failed, and Plegia's landscape was reduced to the desert wasteland it is known for today…I think it was because whatever spell they were trying catastrophically failed." She stretches.

_That…might be why Robin was created. So that Plegia won't just fucking explode again. HOWEVER!_

Ah. What the hell am I doing?

No working while on leave.

_Damn straight._

I wake-up slap myself, to Amelia's amusement and surprise. "That's that, and this is this."

She just looks at me strangely.

"I can worry about work once we're back at base." I grin. "Right now we're busy failing a date."

She giggles and shakes her head.

…

…

The rest of the afternoon passed without a whole lot of fanfare, probably because we're technically soldiers on leave and carrying anything home would be problematic and stupid, so no shopping trips.

_So what did you two do?_

Bona fide theaters exist! Well, it's more like school gym with chairs thrown in, and it's cozy and cramped and seats like maybe 200 people tops, but it exists.

_The chairs are built properly, though, so the people sitting in the back can see the stage still._

So we caught an actual play, complete with actors, mediocre choreography, extra doses of ham, and a fairly riveting plot.

_What was the plot?_

It was a loosely Shakespearean tragedy kind of play, where…it…it's a little like if Hamlet ended with the narrator going "and everyone died. The end." …It petered out at the end.

"I hope that doesn't become us by the end of our little trip." Amelia said lightly when we exited the theatre.

"I'll write and perform a five minute long eulogy for you if that happens." I laugh.

Seriously the main character guy was supposed to be lying on the floor dying and his last sentence lasted a good five minutes. As far as I could tell his script had no periods, only commas.

_It was as if Hamlet's death scene was punctuated by Hamlet going "oh by the way" twenty times._

"By the gods, if that happens, please just put me out of my misery." Amelia laughed. "Still, that was pretty fun! I wonder if Ylisstol has places like these too."

Probably. "We can find out once we get back." At least until I start Phase Two.

_Planning ahead already, eh?_

I had this planned a long time ago.

"Once we get back?" Amelia gets a little tease-y when she's in a good mood…it's adorable. "Thinking that far ahead already?"

"It's not the far ahead." I roll my eyes. "It's only a few months or so."

She stares at me. "A few- how far head is far for you?!"

I pretend to stroke my beard. "Far." which reminds me, I haven't shaved in a while now.

_Our beard grows slowly, so I think we're fine._

…

We rounded off the "date" with a dinner at a fairly fancy looking place.

Well…as fancy as you can get with largely wood-based structures and minimal indoor decoration. After the running with that weird noble guy we stayed away from the rich section of town.

…

_Does this place only specialize on herb products?_

Judging by a lot of produces on sales that we saw while wandering around the town this place sells a lot of

_DISCLAIMER: Amelia told us a lot of this stuff_

Cold-weather herbs and fruits and stuff.

They make it into really delicious…stuff. I don't know how to describe food very well.

_Give it a shot._

Uh…the food I have right now is like a stir-fry of sorts, with the minty stuff we had in the pastry for lunch as its base…I'm fairly sure I see tomatoes, lettuce, green peppers, and some kind of local sun-dried fruit that I don't recognize.

_All sliced into small bite size pieces and cooked until it gives off this faintly spicy minty smell._

"This is pretty good." Amelia mutters. I get the feeling she's trying hard to avoid shoveling food down her mouth in a very un-lady-like fashion. "Ylisstol's a little heavy on the seasoning sometimes, so this is actually really good."

I never noticed.

_You grew up with your parents and they threw salt on everything._

So our sensitivity is different. Fair enough.

"Heavy on seasoning?" Apart from the stir-fry they also have this bread thing, also with the little minty things thrown in.

_Little minty things with a little bit of milk? At least that's what it tastes like._

"Yeah." Amelia blushes faintly. "Ylisstol nobility are fond of meat dishes, and sometimes they don't get prepared correctly or in time…"

In time? Hmm.

…

A smile has been forming on my face for a little while now. "For the record, I don't care about your eating posture." And now I grin.

Amelia has been kind of consciously readjusting herself every few minutes as she ate. Sitting up straighter, taking her elbows off of the table, so on, so forth.

She blushes, rolls her eyes, and eats like a proper lady would.

_Knife becomes food shovel._

…

[Night-ish]

…

"I say we recovered nicely at the end." I say as we walk back to the shepherd quarters (an Inn close to the town militia barracks).

"Impressively so." Amelia laughs. "This is so much better than having to pretend to like all the noble boys that try to woo me."

…

"Is that what you meant by you weren't asked a lot?"

"Yes." Amelia rolls her eyes. "Little noble boy demanding that I go accompany them and I have to play along for an hour, and then they get angry that I don't like them when they don't do anything worthwhile."

…

That's actually really depressing.

"Wow. That sucks." I felt the need to say.

She shrugs. "There's a reason Chrom has such a large fan following…he's not a peacock like the rest of them."

_Ylisse isn't full with people who are badass, why are we surprised by this._

"Are you alright?" Amelia asks me after she looks up at me.

"Yeah, just a bit disillusioned."

She giggles. "You've been associating with the cream of the Ylissean crop, of course you would be."

…

We spent the rest of the walk in comfortable silence until we got back to the inn.

"Thank you for today. It was fun." Amelia said, and gave me a kiss on the cheek before more or less retreating to her room.

_So that went well._

About as well as expected. We didn't make a total fool out of ourselves.

_No post-date euphoria?_

It…felt more like a nice day out with a friend, than…what, a clichéd romantic comedy? I dunno.

"Oh god dammit." Robin grumbles from I have no clue where.

Uh…

"Come out." I growl.

Robin comes out from behind a wall, along with Virion…holding a small pouch of gold his hand and looking suitably smug.

"I'm confused on what the bet was." I frown.

"Her bet was…you would be too focused on your job to treat a lady well." Virion said, smirking.

_She was right on the money, too._

"Judging by your expression I shouldn't have given away my money so quickly." Robin sighs, sitting down at the nearest chair next to the fireplace.

"Yeeah." I'm pretty red, I think… "How was your first day off then?"

"Well enough." Robin leaned back into her chair. "I broke into your room and played with your things."

You did what now?

"I'm sorry?" I frown. "What did you do?"

"Your weapons are perfectly fine." Robin waves nonchalantly.

"Did you…ok, why did you do that?"

"I was curious…and I have no idea how you make something like that work at all."

I'm shaking my head at this point. "So were you the first one back or something?" I ask, since I don't see anyone else around.

"Apart from Virion, I think so." Robin nods thoughtfully. "I know Sumia roped Chrom into doing something; I saw them while I was coming home, but I don't know where anyone else is."

Amelia wanders out into the inn's…lounge? If we can even call it that?

"Ash, Ricken's borrowed your notes." Amelia sighed.

"Did you not lock my door?" I look at Robin with a scowl.

Amelia's eyebrows go up.

"I thought I did." Robin mutters. "Oh well. Ricken would know how to get around that. He's been taking lessons from Gaius."

That can happen?

"What were you doing?" Amelia asks Robin.

"Satisfying my curiosity." Robin has a very faint smirk on her face.

_In other news: Virion saw Amelia come in and retreated amazingly quickly from the lounge area._

Amelia looks thoughtful for a moment. "What are you two to each other?"

What?

I look at Robin, Robin looks at me.

"We're out to kill Grima." We say in unison. "Or something like that." Robin adds.

"Huh…" Amelia stares into the fire.

Alarms are going off in my head at this point, as we sit there in uncomfortable silence.

_We feel uncomfortable, at least._

_…_

The door to the inn opens a few minutes later, and a very tired-looking Stahl carries Lissa over the threshold.

Lissa, meanwhile, is mumbling incoherently and seems to be rather sleepy.

The three of us watch Stahl disappear off upstairs and come back down a minute later.

"What happened?" Robin asks with a frown and a smile.

"She got her hands on some alcohol." Stahl sighs, collapsing onto a table.

He's also pretty skinny looking without his armor, but then his armor is bulkier.

"How much did she have?" Robin's smile turned into a scowl.

Stahl holds up his index finger. "She had about a quarter of a drink."

Robin opens her mouth, blinks, and then takes out something from inside her cloak. "Give this to her."

Stahl looks at it. "An antitoxin? I don't know…"

_Antitoxin: A thing we never, ever used._

"It'll help a little." Robin shrugs. Stahl sighs, gets back up, and disappears from sight.

_Lissa got targeted by assassins, if you remember._

Yeah, but Lon'qu is with her if that happens.

Speaking of Lon'qu…

"Is there anything going on between Lon'qu and Olivia?" I ask.

Robin shrugs. "If there is it's largely from her to him and not the other way around." She then stretches and stands up. "I'm going to bed. C'mon, Amelia. I need to question you."

"Huh, wait, what?" Amelia looks surprised as Robin unceremoniously drags the poor girl off.

I…don't want to know.

…

Ok, I kind of want to know, but I'd like to keep my head on my neck.

…

…

"Ricken."

Ricken sits at my table, and once he hears me call his name he turns and has an utterly beaming smile on his face.

"Hi, Ash! How did your date go?"

"Well enough." I sigh. "How goes your journey through my notes?"

"Great! I learned a lot of stuff school didn't cover!" Ricken's boyish glee is…interesting? I guess? I'm a little drained right now to care. "How did you figure all this out in a few months? This spell compression thing is fascinating!"

A few months…what, two months at most?

"Trial and error, thorough documentation, the works." I yawn. "Now get out, I want to sleep."

"Sure thing!" Ricken jumps up. "Can I borrow this?" He holds up my construction notes on the Chain Greatsword.

"Eh…sure. I want it back in the morning though."

"Thanks!"

…

…

…

Day two.

…

Everyone slept in.

_Everyone?_

Myself included.

…

Day two, afternoon.

Everyone slept in until now, myself included.

"Good mornin'…" slurs Lissa as she stumbles down the stairs while rubbing her eyes.

"Good afternoon to you too, Princess." Fredrick says.

_So not everyone slept in._

Everyone except Fredrick and maybe Chrom, I'm not entirely sure. Fredrick I can understand, since he works super hard and everything.

Robin walks in to the lounge from the inn's kitchen with some bread in her hands (we rented the whole damn place, it feels like), and wordlessly claps Cordelia on the shoulder.

Cordelia jumps so hard she almost sprang to her feet.

"Did something happen to Cordelia?" I ask Amelia who was (kind of against her will, I feel) sitting next to me in the lounge area.

_I think people would've asked unnecessary questions if she was sitting anywhere else, and I think she knew it._

"Remember when Chrom had those recruitment posters?" Amelia said idly.

…ah.

_Cordelia caught Amelia's little comment and now her face matches her hair. Her pretty, pretty red hair._

I caught Robin's eye and she…has the most perfect look of innocent mischief on her face.

…On one hand, I have the day off. On the other…I'm worried that Robin did something to my gear now.

...Might as well go back to my room.

…

…

Let's see…

Initial test on Chain Greatsword...Spooling up…

_The room fills with a gentle humming noise._

Everything looks normal, except for that broken jet connector.

_Not like we can do anything about it anyways._

Right. Rail gun test…activate spell circles…

Everything feels ok.

_We should make a physical checklist in the future._

We really should.

"Back to work so soon? Robin wants us all to rest, you know."

I look up and see Nino staring at me.

"I'm not good at resting." I shrug.

Which is true…for me, being able to mess with magic and do awesome things some of the time is relaxing and enjoyable.

"…You're just like Linus." Nino grumbles. "He doesn't have any fun ever."

Really? "Of your two brother Linus isn't the fun one?" I ask.

"It's weird." She sighs. "Linus loves going around town all the time but he never seems to like doing it. And all Lloyd does is read!" She rages at the heavens a little bit. "I'm gonna go find Lissa."

_Her short green hair disappears from our line of sight and we hear her hopping down the staircase._

Uh…ok?

_Once we add Nowi into the mix the Shepherds will never sleep again._

…

_Ultimately we're still just lazing around our room, staring out the window blankly._

If we're going to be fighting in a desert, do I need to make any modifications to my gear for adaptation purposes?

_Our wind shoes will kick up a lot of sand every time we use it. I don't think there is a way to prevent it._

We can install flaps on our shoes, like…truck-style mudflaps behind the wheels to get the worst of the sand issue out of the way.

…

Actually, the sand issue is pretty pressing. I don't know what would happen if sand gets into the moving components of the Greatsword but I'm pretty sure it won't be good for my health.

Given how narrative works I will most likely end up fighting Gangrel where there's a lot of sand.

_Maybe we can try to lure him to a place where there isn't sand?_

If Validar kicked our ass and he's a shaman, then it stands to reason that Gangrel as a trickster is going to run circles around us. Luring him is probably not an option.

_Maybe we can make an explosive warhead?_

…Spells explode on contact.

_Holy_ _shit_ spells explode on contact.

We can totally do that.

…except we need to make the goddamned warhead to begin with. Fuck.

Still, I need to remember that for the future.

_We just wrote down "holy shit spells explode" in our notebook._

…

One thing at a time; let's get anti-sand flaps for our shoes first.

…

…

Let's see…I think I saw a shoemaker somewhere around here…

The fact that they're all family owned shops with very hard to spot signs makes this pretty difficult, actually…ah ha. Here it is.

…

"You want us to do what?" The man (probably the master of the shop) asks.

"Add a leather flap to my shoes, yes." I say impatiently.

"As long as he's paying it hardly an issue, right, dear?" The master's wife (most likely) says sweetly. I wonder if she's barefoot.

He sighs. "Alright, let me see it."

…

Flap shoe upgrade, get!

I feel really gaudy and stupid. The fact that this is a fairly sizeable leather boot helps it a little, but for all intents and purposes it looks like I'm wearing a teapot on my foot.

_Without the…part where water comes out. The spout._

Because I can't magically detach the flap when I want it to comes down, the flap is weighted by a stone held in place by cloth, so I have to physically unlatch it if I want to use it.

I don't think we're going to get ambushed by a desert, so that shouldn't be an issue.

Even better, if I put the flap down on normal ground I can walk just fine because of the weight on the back (so it drags on the ground instead of go under the shoe), so I just look like I'm wearing miniature skis instead.

Pretty nifty, if I do say so myself.

_And yet we could've avoided all this if we just used leather._

…God dammit.

"Ash! Ash Ash Ash!" Someone yells very excitedly behind me.

That someone being Lissa…along with Lon'qu and Olivia. Huh.

This seems like something I want to avoid being a part of.

"What are you do-what are you wearing?!" Lissa says before bursting in laughter.

"Sand shoes." I say, bringing up my foot and wiggling it.

"Sand shoes." Lon'qu repeats in a total deadpan.

"I use wind magic on my shoes, so without these they'll kick up a lot of sand." I say and point to the flaps.

"I see…you're quite smart, Ash." Olivia says with a...uh.

_A boner inducing smile._

I wasn't gonna say it.

_Although to be fair her allure is probably based on some magical power rather than just her physical traits._

Because obviously the sparkles didn't give it away already…while Olivia is dressed pretty modestly (imagine a very simplistic version of the myrmidon outfit) her sparkles are very much so visible and she's attracting the attention of every male within vision range.

"Lon'qu was assigned to be my bodyguard when I told Robin I wanted to look around town." Olivia murmured shyly when she noticed me glancing around at the men slowing down or stopping to get a better look at her.

"I can see why." I frown. "You didn't go anywhere yesterday?"

She blushes furiously and shakes her head. Lon'qu just rolls his eyes.

"And Fredrick…" Lissa pouts. "Won't let me go around alone either."

"So you asked Lon'qu to pull double duty?" I stare at Lissa.

She shrugs. "They're too busy staring at Olivia anyways."

_That sounded oddly callous coming from Lissa._

"I wish they'd stop." Olivia grumbles.

"At least Lon'qu seems to be immune." I say.

Lissa stares at me with a look that plainly says "I trusted you!"

_Did she expect us to do something?_

"What?" I look at Lissa.

She just continues to stare at me.

I heave a hugely exaggerated sigh. "Lon'qu, if you had to pick between these two, who would you choose?"

Lon'qu rolls his eyes. "What is that supposed to mean, Ash?"

But he blushed just a tiny bit.

"Uh-uhm…" Olivia catches our attention. "If…if you're not busy, Ash…do you want to…uh…"

"Spend time with you guys?" I finish for her. She nods. "Yeah, sure."

…

…

So as it turns out Lissa's blood is actually sugar and caffeine, and if she has too much fun she breaks and it becomes impossible to get her to calm down again.

_Slight exaggeration._

Did Stahl feed her alcohol just to get her to stop?

...

…

"Ah…I'm tired." Olivia moans, sitting down next to a tree.

Somehow, some way, Lissa dragged us out of the town. I don't quite understand how it happened. I don't remember leaving through a gate.

We were really close to the northern wall and suddenly we're here on the east side of town. I…I don't. I don't know what happened.

"She has way too much stamina." I sit down as well. Interestingly enough I don't feel very out of breath; having to carry all that gear must've done me some good.

"As expected of the Princess." Lon'qu says disinterestedly, leaning next to a tree but still standing.

"Look at what I found!" Lissa said happily, dragging Nino along with her.

"How in the what?" I say, because I am very confused by this situation.

Nino looks about as confused as the rest of us.

"Didn't you go looking for Lissa earlier?" I ask her.

"Yes, but she was already gone." Nino said.

"Aww, you were looking for me?!" Lissa emphasizes her excitement by hugging Nino.

I…ok, you know what? I'm not going to question it. I'm just going to smile and nod.

…

…

So Lissa roped Nino into our little outing and we spent the rest of the afternoon outside the town, just lazing about and relaxing in the sun.

At some point Lissa infected Nino and the two bundles of energy just ran us into the ground.

"How." Olivia says tiredly as she watches Nino and Lissa chatter and rampage around the field.

"Looks like our princess has found a kindred spirit." I sigh.

_If you think about it…Nino grew up without a friend in her age group._

Yeah…I guess Nino would be jubilant at finding someone like Lissa, who's like…a little bundle of happiness and friendship.

_Little._

…

Lon'qu just drew a dagger from under his clothes.

"You see something?" I ask him as nonchantly as I can.

"I do not. I do feel something though." Lon'qu says as he scans the landscape before him.

"Maybe we should move closer to the girls." I mutter while I loosen my knife from its sheath.

"I don't count as a girl?" Olivia says, shifting a little closer to Lon'qu.

"You're far more mature." Lon'qu says without skipping a beat.

Pity he can't see Olivia blush bright, bright red.

_Opportunity wasted._

…

…

"What's wrong?" Lissa asks as the three of us catch up to the duo.

"Lon'qu is a little jumpy today." I say with a jerk of my head.

Nino frowns and pulls out her spellbook. "Maybe we should find a place away from the civilians."

Civ…oh, right. She's still a black fang and they don't hurt civvies.

"Or maybe we should head back to the inn…I don't want to be out here without a sword." Olivia says, looking around a little frantically.

"That might be better." I nod. "Let's go."

…

…

We duck down a side path, away from the civilians, and four figures in concealing cloaks jump down from the roof in front of us.

"Shit." I regret my decision to duck down a side path.

"Hold." The first guy says, raising a hand. "I take it you're lord Ash."

Lord? "I don't know about the 'Lord' part." I say while raising my left arm (containing the hidden arm gun).

"Well, Her highness considers you one. Regardless." The lead man pulls down his hood, revealing…a mask bearing the Brand.

Huh.

"Let me guess, you guys are spies under Emmeryn's command." I say, lowering my arm.

"What? Emm employs spies?" Lissa asks indignantly.

"Very astute of you, Sir Ash." The lead spy bows. "We are her highness's eyes and ears for when she cannot leave the castle, and considering the current circumstances…"

Emmeryn very much so cannot leave the castle.

"I see…so what brings you here?" Lon'qu doesn't drop his guard at all.

"This." The lead spy pulls what looks like an envelope from his robes, and hands it to…me.

Uh…it's addressed to me from Emmeryn, too.

"It wasn't for me or Chrom?" Lissa peers at the letter from around my arm.

_She's not quite tall enough to go over the shoulder._

"Let's see what it says." I mutter, and tear it open.

…

_It reads: Ash – I am hereby giving you command of these Ylissean spies and temporary control over the entirety of the Ylissean spy network. While I do not know of the specifics of your plan, I know you have something significant in mind._

_As for why this power was not given to Chrom or Robin: you know full well why this power will be wasted on Chrom, and Robin is simply too upstanding to resort to using spies._

_I wish you well._

_PS: Lissa, stop._

"Ah, dammit." Lissa mumbles.

…I like how she gave me a seriously powerful tool and insulted me at the same time.

_And knew that Lissa would be doing something she shouldn't be doing._

"So…?" Lon'qu narrows his eyes.

"They're clear." I wave the letter at him and then turn towards the spies. "I assume you are aware of what's written inside here?"

"We have been given orders from the Exalt herself." The first spy bows.

Hum…it's a little early, but I guess we can start Plan B now.

"Good. Uh…hm. I'll catch you guys later." I wave to Lon'qu and the girls.

"Wh-wait!" Lissa growls.

Not waiting. Wind boots, full power! Jump!

Good thing the roofs aren't made of straw or anything.

…

…

"Alright, this should be good enough." I say, having not moved an inch after jumping onto the roof.

"Should you really have done this?" The lead spy asks.

I shrug. "Lissa is a little too talkative for her own good sometimes."

The lead spy chuckles.

"So." I turn to look at him and his mask…it's less of a mask and more of a cloth stapled to his face, if staples existed. "You guys are the third arm of Ylisse, I take it?"

"We are responsible for helping Emmeryn keep the peace." The lead spy nods. "Especially when she was younger."

…I don't really want to know how they kept the peace, then.

_But if she's remembered as a great pacifist then these guys are good enough to not get caught…besides, I don't think Emmeryn would actually go for assassination missions._

Good point. "How good do you think you guys will be at moving around in Plegia?" I ask him.

"The four of us are originally Plegians. It might as well be our back yard." The lead spy says with a note of pride.

_How convenient._

I nod. "Great. I have my first and probably only orders for you guys."

Commence Plan B!

The spy group bows. "Understood."

"Go into Plegia and find the families of the generals sympathetic to Ylisse, and then secure their safety or escape route out of the country."

The lead spy looks up. "That's quite a tall order."

I grin. "Yeah. Those family members will certainly be well guarded by pro-Gangrel forces…so don't get overeager with trying to get them out."

The lead spy bows. "We hear and obey, and, if I may speak frankly? You're even more demanding than Emmeryn." He shakes his head.

I blink in surprise. "I just outdid Emmeryn with one command?"

"She never sent us to protect the family of an enemy." The lead spy grins…

And he's gone.

Man, he's good. I need to learn how to do that.

…

Well, phase two is now underway. The question is how long is this going to take.

_Maybe we should also go back home before Lissa rips the town to pieces looking for answers._

Right, right…

…

…

…

"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAsh!"

_Take a guess who that was. Go on. Guess._

…

So an enraged Lissa may or may not have just delivered a flying punch into my stomach.

And I may or may not be on the ground in pain.

…

"Wow, she's a better puncher than I thought." Robin says from somewhere above my head.

I walked one step into the inn and the first thing I saw was a yellow blur.

"Guess those lessons from Vaike are paying off." She continues to say idly. "Now then, what's this about a spy?"

_She says as she goes through our pockets for the letter._

She finds it, too.

She finds the letter and reads it while we're still busy trying to re-learn the art of breathing.

"Oh, so that's how it is." Robin says after she reads the letter. "I don't know if she's being appraising of you or not."

"Makes the two of us." I gasp, finally able to sit in a way other than "doubling over in pain."

_We rolled over so we're now on our back._

"Ok, so you now have access to the Ylissean spy network." Robin says in a muted tone. "What are you doing with it? From what Lissa told me you already sent them off on a mission."

"Yeah. They're going into Plegia. I'm not going to say any more than that." Whoo. Breathing is good. Breathing is life.

"Ugh. Really? Why the secrecy all of a sudden?" Robin…snaps? She's obviously not too happy about it.

"Because it's better than having my targets dead." I say, and pull Robin close. "Look, there's a lot at stake here. Trust me on this."

"Fine…though I want a full briefing after whatever your planning happens." Robin grumbles.

…

…

Day two actually ended pretty pleasantly. The inn more or less hosted a party for the Shepherds complete with a lot of food and minimal alcohol (courtesy of Fredrick).

_Not that we mind since we don't drink._

At all.

…

Around fifteen minutes into said party the room more or less divided into two halves:

Fredrick, Miriel, Maribelle, Virion on one side, and then…everyone else on the other.

_Not even Lon'qu?_

Lon'qu was captured by Olivia so I don't think he's getting anywhere near the cool people circle.

_And what about us?_

"Are you worried about Chrom?" Robin asks, following my line of sight.

I nod. "He must be really worried right now."

Chrom's smiles aren't going anywhere near his eyes, for one.

Robin scratches her cheek. "He is...he's getting a bit impatient."

"No surprises there." I stare at Chrom…his body language just screams discomfort. "How goes our preparations?"

"We're effectively done. Virion wanted us to stick around for another half day and prepare more supplies for some reinforcements…something about a retainer of his." Robin chews on a slice of meat. "Chrom doesn't really want to stick around but Virion said she was a flier, and I want more fliers."

Flier…Cherche is showing up early?

_Was there a reason for her showing up two years later?_

If there was one I certainly don't remember it.

"Besides." Robin glances at Sumia trying valiantly to get Chrom to loosen up.

…

I look between her and Sumia. "Besides…?" She just kind of trailed off there.

She shrugs.

…

…

After dinner time, I find Amelia sitting in my room.

_On the side of our bed._

Why the hell are you in my room?

"Hi." I wave.

"Ash! Uh…" She's holding a note in her hand. My note?

_The markings are different._

"What's up?"

"Um…" She's getting used to the slang at the very least. "I got this from Phila." She holds up a note. "I wanted to show it to Chrom but he's a little busy right now."

…

Internet people busy or normal people busy?

_What does that even mean?_

"And so you're waiting here? Isn't your room closer?" I'm not entirely sure what I'm doing right now.

_You're trying to kick a girl out of your room._

She sighs. "Lissa hijacked it and she's bouncing off the walls."

Lissa and Gaius had a lot of sweets at dinner.

I shake my head. "Wow. It's going to be weird to see a serious Lissa once we start marching."

"Am I bothering you?" Amelia asks.

"Nah, just surprised me, that's all." I sit at my table and…what should I do now?

_What were we going to do?_

We were just going to chill until we fell asleep, because dinner just happened and there's no internet to keep us awake at one in the morning.

"This is uncomfortable." Amelia mutters when we sit in silence for a minute or so.

"Highly uncomfortable." I agree with an exaggerated nod.

"What do you do in your room, anyways?" She asks, looking at the Chain Greatsword lying against wall on the opposite side of the bed.

"Maintenance." I say simply.

_Idle thought: how many death flags did we enable for Amelia during our not-date?_

…

Uh. Well, shit.

_I think all we're missing is an "if we come back from this" promise to ensure a death. _

"For your weapons? Don't you need a blacksmith for that?" Amelia asks. "What's wrong?"

I guess I'm a little pale right now? "Nah…well, I do need a blacksmith if something breaks, but for the time being as long as I can ensure that it keeps working, I'm good to go."

"Ok." Her frown didn't disappear.

…

Another minute passes, and she springs to her feet. "I think I'll interrupt Sumia for this." She says nonchalantly.

…

Shit. Let's do it.

"Amelia."

She turns, because I sound drastically different. "Yes?"

Uh… "Can you make me a promise?"

She huffs. "If this is a declaration of love I don't want to hear it. Not before a fight."

…Wow, she's actually genre savvy.

I laugh. "Nah, not that. Promise me that you follow my orders when I give them to you."

"Huh?" Amelia's eyebrows just vanished into her hair. "I heard about you getting some kind of commanding presence from Emmeryn. Are you trying to exercise that now?"

_Well._

"If it makes it easier on you, sure." I smile. "Look, if I'm being paranoid we can laugh about it later. Just promise that you will follow my orders without question when I give them."

She rolls her eyes. "Fine, fine. Whatever you say, sir." And then leaves the room.

Dear god I hope I'm being paranoid.

…

…

…

And on the last day, Nino woke me up via jumping on my bed.

_Dat skirt flutter._

Yes…fortunately she's smart and wears pants.

"What's the rush?" I sit up.

"Chrom got good news last night." Nino just sounds so energetic. "Apparently Emmeryn broke the siege on Ylisstol with the reinforcements from Ferox."

So that's what it was. "Awesome! So…why am I waking up early?"

"Chrom wants us to get a head start on things; apparently Gaius caught some shifty looking people entering and leaving the town in a hurry."

…huh.

"Also, Robin wants your advice." Nino finishes, as a girl I don't recognize stumble into the room.

"Niiino…" Oh good lord that's Lissa? "Heeelp meeeee~"

_Our dear Lissa is very sleepy and very not dressed (she's wearing just a nightgown). Her hair is unkempt and unbraided and honestly she looks...very not princess-like._

She has low blood pressure after eating like a metric ton of sugar last night. What?

"Liss-oh." Nino said as Maribelle chased Lissa into the room and dragged her out without even a second word. "What just happened?" Nino looks at me, pointing to the empty doorway.

…

…

"I dreamt that I was being chased by a giant sponge." Lissa explains while getting breakfast.

"And so in your half-awake state you went to find Nino to save you." I…

"Yep!" Lissa says cheerfully.

Y'know what, I'm not even going to ask.

_This explains so much about Owain._

…

"So what did you need me for?" I ask Robin after I got my breakfast (bread, pancakes, some kind of dip).

"Him." Robin points to the man she was talking about with a spoon.

…

Let's see…fairly grizzled face, spiky orange hair, obviously mercenary…

Hi, Gregor. Why is Nowi not with you?

"He says he's looking for work. I wonder if he has anything to do with you." Robin says simply.

"Gregor a good sellsword, very good value for your money." Gregor says in his very English-voice-actor-sounding voice.

"So you say." Robin says after taking a bite of her soup.

_You're very focused on food._

It's early in the day and I'm Chinese.

"I don't know…Ash." Robin says. "Should we hire him?"

"Why not talk to Chrom about it?" I look at Chrom in question, who is…uh, very, very happy this morning.

_Maybe rule 34 happened? We can ask Amelia later._

"Chrom's preoccupied, as you can clearly see." Robin sighs. "Obviously he gets the final decision but I want your input."

…because we both have unusual knowledge. Ok.

I shrug. "We can always use another sword in our king-slaying mission."

Gregor claps his hands together. "Ah! So Shepherds going to kill Gangrel! Good for us short term, yes?"

Robin freezes. "How in the hells…"

Gregor grins. "Chrom very easy to identify. Shepherds would go to Longfort if here on diplomacy."

…Smart man.

"What do you mean, short term?" Robin asks with one hell of a scowl on her face.

"Gangrel dies and Plegia has a power vacuum." I say. Gregor nods.

"Young man is smart. You have plan to counteract power vacuum, yes?"

…Gregor is terrifyingly intuitive.

I smirk. "It would be great if that's the case; we might as well take him along, Robin."

"Right, right." Robin says distractedly, opening up her notebook to scribble furiously in it.

"Excellent! Gregor will not disappoint pretty lady boss!" Gregor says with a "leave it to me!" fist thump on his chest.

…

However, this does mean that Gregor either did not meet Nowi and thus isn't able to rescue her, or he failed to rescue her entirely.

_But if he failed they both would be dead, or he would still be at the slavers camp._

Right, so fortunately that's not a possibility.

This does mean, though, that we stand a chance of actually failing to recruit Nowi unless we find out where she is.

Makes me wish I didn't send the spies out so early.

…

Right, before I forget.

"Amelia. Did you see what Chrom was up to last night?" I ask her as nonchalantly as possible.

"Nope." Amelia says a little sadly. "Sumia stopped talking when she heard me knock, but I don't think they were doing anything untoward."

Ok, let's go with that.

_To be fair, Chrom is very much romantically challenged, like the rest of the JRPG protagonists._

To be fair we're just anti-social and have spent way too much time on the internet.

"Were you expecting anything?" Amelia asks with a faint blush and a tiny smile.

"Well…a little." I try to put on a good poker face and fail miserably.

...

[Midday]

…

In the end we were, in fact, waiting for Cherche. Cherche and some other guy.

"This is a fellow Wyvern Knight of Rosanne, his name is Kyle." Cherche said as the other guy bowed to Chrom.

_Looks like we found Kyle, and he actually is about that tall._

…That is the most dated joke. Besides Leeroy Jenkins.

Let's see…Cherche is almost as tall as I am, and Kyle is a little bit taller than me. I'm not sure why I care about that right now. Also, Kyle is a little representative of Sacred Stones Kyle; their face structure is similar (our Kyle looks a little more effeminate) and the hair color is wildly different (ours has black hair).

_In other words: He only reminds us of Sacred Stones Kyle because his name is Kyle._

Also, Cherche's outfit has her back exposed. It is amazingly sexy, and clashes with my idea of safety. The fact that she's wearing like a miniature coat that only covers the top of half of her exposed back isn't helping.

_At least she's legitimately legal._

"Yes?" Also she caught me staring.

"It, uh…doesn't seem very safe." I'm a little tongue tied right now.

"Oh, you mean my outfit?" She says with a very friendly smile. I nod. "I'm a Wyvern Rider, I don't need to worry about being attacked from the back."

…

Did she…did she seriously just say that?

"Cherche is the finest Wyvern Rider you will ever hope to meet, Ash." Virion says with a light laugh. "I have found that it is often best to trust her judgment when it comes to her field of expertise."

In other words, let the slightly creepy lady do her thing. Got it.

"Do you have an interest in aerial combat?" Cherche asks me, still with that smile on her face.

I kind of wish she doesn't have that dragon wings head decoration thing; it's a little off-putting. "I do, actually." And I also wish I can have access to a Griffon.

"Wonderful!" Cherche claps her hands together. "I'll introduce you to Minerva at the first opportunity."

Uh. I know Minerva is her Wyvern.

_What does "introduce" mean in Cherche-speak?_

Minerva is sitting just next to her and stares at me for a few moments, before losing interest.

"Oh, hmm." Cherche sounds disappointed. "I guess she doesn't find you very appealing."

_What does appealing mean in Cherche-speak?_

"Uh…" Do I want to be appealing to a Wyvern to begin with? "I hope we can become friends in the future then, Minerva."

The Wyvern just growls…a very rumbly growl.

…

…

With all that out of the way Chrom finally gave us the order to depart. I have to admit having three days off right before a major campaign actually didn't do all that much good for my nerves.

…

About an hour after we left town Robin jumped into my wagon (we're not going very fast; road is actually kind of bumpy) unannounced.

I say "my wagon" because I'm sharing it with supplies, and they don't count as living people.

"Ash, I have a mission for you."

Sounds important. "What's going on?"

"Well…" Robin drums her fingers on her notebook. "Before we left a villager got to Chrom and roped him into helping him get his daughter back from a slave trade business in Plegia."

Oh.

"But I don't want to deviate too much from our travel path; once we get discovered it'll be a lot harder to move around." Robin continued. "So I'm thinking of sending a detachment to take the slave ring instead."

_I should mention now that the wagons are decorated like Plegian supply wagons, so we can fool someone from a distance._

"Ok, and since we have Cherche and Kyle, we now have a fair number of fliers…you want me to go with them?" I say, and then see Robin nod. "Cool, no problem."

"Excellent." Robin smiles. "Considering the circumstances, I'll have Kellam and Gaius go on the mission as well."

Time out.

"It's an infiltration mission?" I frown.

She nods. "Well, yeah. I don't want to kill everyone in the camp, just the bad guys."

Just the bad guys, she says.

"Ok, just checking." I unhook the Chain Greatsword and lay it on the wagon floor; I need to resist the urge to use it, since I don't have spare chains anymore if I break them.

…

This is actually a pretty impressive lineup. Because of the utter lack of foliage in our path (beyond shrubs and stuff) Virion alone can handle picking off any scouts that might see us, so all the fliers are being dedicated to this mission.

Kellam and Gaius rides with Kyle and Cherche respectively (with Minerva taking a liking to Gaius's shirt. I guess the wyvern is a sweet tooth)

And I'm riding with Cordelia, interestingly enough.

"Amelia is technically the ranking Knight of the three, so she's the escort if we run across any enemy fliers on our way there." Cordelia had explained with a scowl. "Is there something wrong?"

I shrug. "No, not really." I can tell she's not overly fond of me to start with.

_I guess our relationship is starting at negative support points._

_…_

"For the record, I don't like you very much." Cordelia growled after we took off into the air.

According to Robin the slavers camp should be about an hour's flight if we go at a leisurely pace, which we kind of have to, since if we burn ourselves out rushing to the camp we're going to have a hell of a time rushing back out.

Also, "Because I ruined your chances with Chrom?" I say.

Judging by the sputtering I hit my mark.

_It wasn't a very hard mark to hit though._

"Yes." She says in a small voice. At least she admits it.

"What were you going to do if I didn't come along? Stare at him longingly from across the room?"

More sputtering.

I really shouldn't be giving relationship advice. "Chrom isn't good at recognizing love; you have to hit him in the head with it. On top of which you have to compete with Sumia now…think you can do it?"

Stuttering instead of sputtering. I think we've made progress.

...

She more or less stays quiet for the rest of the trip.

Correction: she more or less stays quiet but I can hear her hum softly to herself during the trip…I can only catch snippets of what she's humming over the sound of the wind.

…

…

Soon enough, we see something that might be the slavers camp (it's hidden really well against aerial attackers, with the tents almost blending into the sand) and put down a fair distance from them.

_If Sumia didn't see some people walking outside we would've missed it entirely._

"Gaius, Kellam: infiltrate the camp and see what we're up against." Amelia commanded.

_Why's Amelia the operation commander and not you?_

Because Chrom added her into the Shepherds, so she's as much of an officer as the rest of us. Also, because she opened her mouth first.

"Got it." Gaius says calmly before strolling forward into the camp.

_He's really confident about this._

He…used to be a convict. I think that would give him some knowledge of how a person outside the law works. Huh.

…

And now, we wait.

.

.

.

{ === + === }

Author notes:

UST = Unresolved Sexual Tension for those of you who don't spend a lot of time on TVTropes.


	14. From - Outside the Slaver Camp

…

…

…

And now, we wait more.

_It's probably been like five minutes_

It feels like fifteen hours.

We came down pretty much in the middle of the open…not-quite-sand. It's more small rocks and gravel than straight-out sand. There's a change in elevation between us and the camp that obscures our wyverns and pegasi from the slaver camp.

_In other words, there's a hill._

But there's no cover against the sun for us.

So this is kind of excruciating.

…

…

"Ash, would you like to come over here?" I hear Cherche ask, and turn to look.

Minerva is sitting in a very cat-ish way (or a dog sit, whichever one), and Cherche is sitting underneath her wings, using said wings to provide some level of shade.

_She's also sitting on a handkerchief…lady is prepared._

"That looks, uh, pretty snug." The wyvern wingspan isn't very big when it's not stretched out fully.

Cherche smiles. "Oh, are you worried about something? Don't worry, I won't bite." Her smile is easily the most terrifying thing I think I've seen, despite how sweet it looks. She pats the ground next to her.

…

Eh…sure, why not.

"Thanks." I say and sit next to her.

"What do you think about Minerva?" Cherche asks with the same pleasant smile on her face.

For the record the distance between the two of us is very much so "too close for comfort." Especially since the perfume she's wearing is…very, uh…

I lost my train of thought.

_Minerva._

"Right, uh…" I still don't have my train of thought back.

She giggles. "I see. I'm glad you think that way of her."

But I didn't say anything.

"Can you read minds or something?" I finally say.

She smiles…harder? I dunno. "It's pretty easy to tell what most people think of Minerva…at least, most people I've met."

I assume 'most people' doesn't refer to anyone who's ever been near a Wyvern.

"I didn't think you introduced Minerva to most people." I say, looking up at the Wyvern (who's also looking down at me).

She…she titters. I don't really know how else to describe it. She titters and Minerva growls along with her.

I'm…a little confused on exactly what she finds funny, to be honest.

Or if she found anything funny to begin with.

I can't word very well; Cherche is distracting in her…maturity? Or something.

She's like the sexiest woman I've met so far, and I've known her directly for like, ten minutes.

…

I'm now suddenly very, very happy that I didn't say that out loud.

…

…

_We sit in relative silence for a few minutes; it's just too quiet and oddly serene for conversation._

I don't know how long a few minutes is, I just know that nobody felt like walking away from the shade provided by their mounts.

If all of Plegia is like this then we're gonna have a serious issue once the real battle starts. This sun can probably cook us alive if we stand out in the open for too long.

_To be fair it's not really blistering hot: the temperature is decent, but the sun is unbearable._

…

…

And then the silence is broken by Cordelia nearly screaming in fear.

…because Kellam literally came out of fucking nowhere and tapped her on the shoulder.

"How long have you been there?!" She demands as she scrambles away from him.

"A little while, actually." Kellam sighs. "We have a problem, Gaius has been caught."

Uh?

Wait, wait. "What do you mean, caught?" It's been, like, fifteen minutes.

_Keep in mind we have horrible time keeping abilities._

Kellam leans against one of the Pegasus. "I don't know the details, but Gaius has attracted some attention and now he can't get out."

Judging by how shallow his breath is he ran pretty hard to get here, I think.

"That's fine for now, I think; what about the slaves in the camp?" Amelia says.

_That's fine for now?_

"Um…" Kellam takes a few deep breaths. "It seems to be a camp focused exclusively on trading young women; they also seemed to have captured an Anna, though I'm not sure exactly what happened there."

Huh, so Annas _are_ considered their own race…informally speaking.

"An Anna?" Cordelia frowned. "What's that?"

"A trader group comprised entirely of red-haired women named Anna." Kellam says and stands back up. "So what do we do now?"

Uh…hmm.

…

"What are the odds of us busting in there and killing every slaver?" I ask.

Kellam frowns and scratches his neck. "Pretty low; there're around twenty guards, some of them fairly well armed…plus the place is fairly well defended, and we don't have the manpower to brute force our way through…"

"How's their armor?" Amelia shoots me a glance.

"Eh... most of them have pretty light armor." Kellam frowns.

_Score!_

"I have enough ammo; it shouldn't be too much of a problem." I shrug.

"Can you reliably hit all of them from this distance?" Amelia asks.

…

Well, shit.

"No, huh?" She sighs. I didn't even need to say anything. "Ok then, plan B; we air units will strike the enemy from above while Kellam and Ash ensures the escape of the slaves."

…

Uh…"That is a horrible plan." I stare at Amelia.

She shrugs. "Not like we have much of a choice; the longer we wait the less effective we'll be in this blasted sun."

_She's got a point._

Right, right…

"Kellam, you can sneak in by yourself easily enough. I'll circle around the outside." I say as the girls (and one boy) saddle up and get ready to take to the air.

"Ash, we'll begin our assault once you have launched your attack." Amelia says before her Pegasus propels her into the air.

"Are you sure about this?" Kellam asks me worriedly as we watch the fliers fly away from the camp to avoid being spotted too early.

"Nope." I say happily, and kick my wind shoes into gear. "I'll see you inside the camp." I say as I skate off (kinda, sorta) toward the camp.

_Half skating, half being propelled by your shoes._

…

…

These flaps work pretty well; I'm not really kicking up a cloud behind me.

_It's probably better to assume that we're being spotted anyway though._

Right; let's see…first sniping location…that hill overlooking the camp looks good. Not too high and big enough for me to lie down on a bed of fucking sand.

…

…

Well, I did say it was a bed of sand.

This place isn't nearly sturdy enough; I turned off my wind shoe and immediately sank an inch or so…oh well, moving on then. Let's take a better look at the camp.

Let's see…

It's way too far for me to make out fine detail, but at the very least I can assume that the people walking around are not slaves. Said slaves are probably being kept in those very large blobs of…whatever, probably cages or something, given how high up they are compared to the ground.

_I wonder why they put girls on pedestals._

Ick. I need to get closer than this if I want a clean shot in this goddamned glare.

I should've invested in a hat, or a pair of shades.

…

Fuck it, let's do this.

…

[3rd Person camera]

…

"So how do I know you're not working for the militia?" One of the slavers growled, waving a knife inches from Gaius's face.

"If I were I'd be robbing Ylisse, c'mon, man." Gaius says with the perfect mixture of exasperation and begging, but never taking his eyes off of the knife's keen edge. "I certainly wouldn't be out here without a guard behind me."

Gaius's problem stemmed from the little mark that branded him as a captured criminal.

While the slavers didn't see the mark, Gaius was recognized because of his past criminal record and his ultimate arrest, the latter being the cause of his current little problem.

"Must be horrible when you can't even trust other people." A small girl with bright yellow hair and extremely revealing outfit said snidely, sitting inside a cage perched conveniently at the slaver's waist height.

Unfortunately, the cage gave her no protection against one of the slavers kicking it and knocking her head into the opposite cage wall; the cage itself was secured fairly well and didn't budge from its position, though Gaius instinctively flinched at the sound of wood snapping.

"That trust of yours landed you here, girly." A slaver taunted.

"Wow, she's really light." Gaius couldn't help but remark.

"And she never shuts up." The lead slaver agreed, looking at Nowi clutching her head in pain. "If she wasn't so incredibly violent we'd have no problems selling her."

"Nowi isn't property." Nowi grumbled, still clutching her head.

"You are now." The leader slaver reached into the cage and wrapped his hand around Nowi's throat. "It's best if you know your position; your previous owners were quite lenient with you, but rest assured that we will not do the same." He says over Nowi's sputtering.

"You shouldn't kill your merchandise." Gaius said lightly, hating himself a little for even saying that sentence to begin with.

The slaver let go, and Nowi collapsed to the floor, coughing. "Oh, don't worry. I know when to stop."

_Creepy bastard. _Gaius thought. _Now how do I get out of here?_

"Nevermind; let him up and confiscate his sword." The lead slaver waves his hand, and Gaius was allowed to get back onto his feet unimpeded. "I have better things to worry about." He says, walking up to a larger cage, containing an Anna.

The 4th Paralogue's Anna, to be more specific.

"To think you were stupid enough to wander into one of our fortresses…well, I'm not one to pass on a free meal." The lead slaver said with a ferocious grin, to the accompanying chuckles of his underlings.

"Yeah, I really messed that up, didn't I?" Anna said cheerily. "Well, I'm not too worried right now."

"Oh, good girl, good girl." The lead slaver said creepily. "We'll show you a good time…it's a pity that Annas have no resale value."

"What?!" Anna demanded. "What do you mean, no resale value?! I'll have you know we are a very valuable commodity among all the realms!"

"Of what he said that's what annoyed you?" Gaius couldn't help but wonder.

"I don't worry about things that can't happen." Anna snapped back with a cocky grin.

"Oh really?" Slaver Boss's grin was downright predatory. "Let's see if you can keep that spirit of yours a few hours from now."

His attention was then immediately shifted onto an explosion of dust and dirt on the outskirts of his camp.

…

"Shit, I missed." Ash snarled, skating toward the camp with his wind shoes. "Oh well, three out of four isn't bad…didn't expect the impact to be so huge though." He said as he loaded another nail into the rail gun.

He then took aim (to the best of his currently-moving ability) and fired again.

…

"What's going on?!" Slaver Boss demanded, striding to the north side of camp and seeing…the guards on the north side dead, their corpses very, very close to each other and all with their head pointed to the inside of the camp.

Unfortunately for him he saw no arrow, and thus didn't know exactly what the problem was. He did know, however, that they were under attack, and whatever the attacker was using, it caused very violent and bloody deaths.

A loud crash sounded behind him and he swiveled to see…

Gaius tackling one of his men into Anna's cage.

Anna then held the man in a stranglehold and relieved him of his sword, before running said sword through the man's back. "Thanks, thief!" Anna said happily while stealthily pulling out a small spellbook from underneath her very tattered clothing.

"Gaius; a pleasure, I'm sure." Gaius says smoothly as he quickly identified a weak spot in the slaver guard roster. With practiced speed and skill he cut down the poor, still-stunned man and bolted out of the ring of guards.

"I thought as much." Slave Boss sneered. "We have a runner!" He roared.

…

[1st person camera]

…

Where the fuck did all those archers come from?!

…

Oh well, it's not like I can just stop mid-charge.

…I wish my shoes were faster though…but if there're so many archers, then that means Gaius is a little bit screwed.

Let's…do this little thing here…

…

[3rd person camera]

…

The slave boss found himself entranced by the sudden trail of dust from the southern side, where his archers were deployed in case of a slave running away (the other three sides either had no cover or a hill, which made it easier for his pair of wyvern riders to catch up to them, and thus did not have archers posted).

Speaking of the Wyvern riders, their mounts were stubbornly refusing to leave the ground for some unknown reason.

He then heard the screaming of his archers, and immediately knew that something was wrong.

By now, however, the camp had woken up, and guardsmen rushed to the southern side of the camp with their weapons ready, both to handle the new, unknown threat and to catch the escaped thief.

"Damn." Gaius cursed as he looked on from behind a cage (containing a pair of girls who shielded him from view), having doubled back under the cover of the camp's ramshackle tent placement. "This just went straight to hell." He breathed, watching four Swordmasters come to the Slaver boss's protection.

…

[1st person camera]

…

That's…a lot more than just twenty guards. Damn, Kellam, they lied to you.

The front of the camp is just a mish-mash of rearranged wagons and carriages and barrels, forming this very ramshackle but oddly sturdy-looking makeshift wall. The guards are probably hiding behind the walls given the fact that one guy popped his head out and immediately went back in.

_We can probably clear the wall in a jump._

We could, but I don't think it'll help us very much. Plan B, what's the highest vantage point in the camp?

Over…there, the comparatively larger tent that probably belongs to the camp leader…though I don't know if it'll hold my weight.

…

I hear a roar overhead, and look up.

Cherche…and Minerva. They're flying very, very fast toward the camp.

_Kyle and his Wyvern come close second._

Wyverns are a hell of a lot faster than Pegasi, if this is anywhere near their top speed.

_One of the slaver archers, getting a little too ballsy for his own good, clambers onto a crate in order to get a better shot at the wyvern rushing toward the camp._

_Given the speed that Cherche was going and the fact that she's equipped with a large fuckoff Poleaxe, the Archer didn't get a chance to do much of anything before he was crudely bisected, with his viscera splattering onto his friends on the camp grounds._

_But of course the active mind didn't see any of it because he didn't have the vantage point. We only heard the roar of the Wyvern and…_

Judging by that screaming I think Cherche just killed someone in a very flashy way…flashy enough to be seen by all the camp slaves, at least.

Oh well…Plan C, find the enemy lead and shoot him in the head.

Hi guards. Bye guards, you guys really should be paying more attention to the guy going past you, and not the girl in the sky.

_We zoom past the guards, and one of them has the mind to say "get him!" when we're nowhere near arms reach._

…

This camp is odd.

On one hand there's literally equipment and material thrown around everywhere, and on the other hand there's quite a lot of space despite the hoarder-esque clutter. There're a lot of long and narrow paths between the cages, tents, boxes, and whatever. Long enough for me to run pretty fast, actually.

If I can actually get my damn speed up, that is.

…

Oh. Well now.

_We see a large, slightly-imposing man being surrounded by four Swordmasters._

That must be our guy. Commencing operation "Solution type: 'murica".

_Our vision is then blocked by some soldiers running toward us._

…After I figure out how to get around all these guys running everywhere. Jesus, how many people are in this damn camp?!

…

[3rd person camera, back up a minute or so]

…

The Slave Boss caught a glimpse of the woman on the Wyvern and thought, fleetingly, that he would like to have her for the night.

That thought was quickly replaced by "holy shit we're screwed" as parts of human scattered onto the ground around him…parts of his ex-archer, to be exact.

"Sir, please retreat to safety." One of the Swordmasters say, his gaze fixed upon the Wyvern flying over their head.

"Right." The Slave Boss retreats back to his tent calmly; having had multiple attempts on his life before, he wasn't about to panic or to grandstand unnecessarily.

"Now, what should we do about that?" One of the Swordmasters asks while still staring at the Wyvern circling overhead.

"If our fliers can get into the air this'll go a lot faster." Another Swordmaster grumbles as he shoots a disapproving glare at the Wyverns stubbornly refusing to take off into the air…or to be saddled at all by their riders; the Wyverns kept on biting the handlers every time they got too close.

"Got it!" They suddenly hear, and turn quickly to see Anna scrambling out of her cage.

"Damn. Don't let her get away!" A Swordmaster yells to the slave henchmen scattered about the camp, and one of them lunges forward to grab her.

Anna neatly cuts his hand off and then, with a turn and a lunge, drives her sword into his throat. "You needed twenty men just to catch me. What makes you think _one_ of you will do anything?" She says coyly.

"Indeed." A Swordmaster (I don't know which one) lunges forward with frightening speed and slashes at Anna.

Anna blocks it with relative ease but gets knocked off balance by the weight of the Swordmaster's charge.

The two exchange a few more blows, with Anna on the losing side.

"Yikes! You're actually good!" She says before adding a little extra flair to her evasions, kicking up dirt and sand into his eyes with each dodge.

"And your cheap tricks won't work on me." The Swordmaster says confidently, stepping back out of range.

Whatever Anna was going to say was drowned out by a Wyvern's roar as Kyle dove into the gaggle of slaver henchmen still behind the wall at full speed before stopping abruptly, causing a massive shockwave of wind and fire and blew the poor, nameless henchmen in all directions.

A few seconds later, Pegasi Knights dove down onto the stunned henchmen and systematically began to eliminate them one by one with ruthless precision…the ones that were not already killed by the makeshift wall collapsing on top of them.

The Swordmaster, distracted by the sight of the Pegasi knight swooping down from the sky and mercilessly cutting his allies, noticed too late the red headed Anna's sword headed toward his neck.

"Got one!" Anna cheered, jiggling her sword a little just to make sure that it was properly lodged in the man's heart.

"You!" One of the remaining Swordmasters snarls as he bolts forward, intent on cutting her down.

And then a nail entered his body and blew it wildly to the side.

"What the…" Anna looked at the Swordmaster corpse in shock as its momentum threw it into Nowi's cage, breaking Nowi free with a series of loud cracks.

"Ooh, that one landed pretty good." Ash says with a grin, standing on top of another cage with his railgun in hand. Anna immediately noticed the odd equipment and green-glowing shoes, and identified this man as a prime business opportunity.

"How in the world…" One of the other Swordmasters started to say. The second part of his sentence was replaced with gurgle from his throat as Kellam easily ran a knife into it.

The last Swordmaster reacted instinctively, lunging at Kellam with his sword.

Nowi, seemingly from out of nowhere, intercepts the Swordmaster by driving her elbow right into the man's side, causing him to fall back out of confusion and pain. He then yelped in shock as the little girl swept his feet from under him with amazing speed, landing him flat on his back.

The Swordmaster quickly scrambled to his feet, yelling obscenities at the little girl. The girl simply grinned at him in response.

And then he stopped yelling because Ash shot him with a nail and threw his corpse into the ground.

_Man, sniping isn't very interesting to describe, is it._

"Oh, I hit. Nice." Ash murmured as he took out some more nails from the box on his belt and fed it into his rifle. "Also, who do I have to pay off to buy some good quality ammo around here?"

Unbeknownst to everyone, the slaver boss retreated from the battlefield, his figure hidden from the Ylissean air units because said air units were preoccupied with wiping out the now panicked slaver remnants.

…

[1st Person camera]

…

_Sometime later, say, about fifteen minutes._

…

Well, that went well.

We killed all the guards and none of the slave girls, so it went well, and nobody took any serious injuries to boot. It went especially for me, since if I aimed straight and missed I probably would've killed a girl.

_Based on the snippets of debriefing we overheard between Amelia and Gaius, this camp was more of an intermediary than active slavers or active sellers, so they were comparatively less capable in combat ability._

That being said because they're a trusted reseller of slaves (god that just sounds wrong) their boss has friends in high places…relatively speaking.

_Gaius gets credit for finding out so much about the slaver boss's operation though._

Might be why he got caught so fast; he was snooping around in a pretty tightly-knit camp.

…

Speaking of the boss.

"No boss?" I ask Kellam as he steps out of the boss slaver tent.

He shakes his head. "The back of the tent has a huge hole; he probably got away."

"Damn." I say with a snap of my fingers.

_Though we expected as much._

"Why didn't you send the fliers out after him?" Gaius demanded.

"I thought we'd see him if he ran away." I sighed. "Obviously that wasn't the case."

"Hey! What are you guys!?" I hear a very youthful voice which probably belongs to Nowi, turn to look…

…ok, I kind of wish I didn't look now.

Nowi is dressed like, well, Nowi. Which is very bad for someone who has no desire to be arrested.

_She's also like the height of a thirteen year old, which is…odd?_

"Do you have something less…uh, revealing, to wear?" I ask with a frown.

Nowi pouts. "What's wrong with how I dress?" She has her hands on her hips, too.

…Well.

"Nevermind." I sigh. "So, what do we do now?" I ask while looking around the camp.

Gaius and Anna were making themselves more useful than the rest of us combined by unlocking the cages and freeing the…dear lord, how many girls were here?!

"I count at least thirty." Kellam whispers to me.

All in various stages of undress that frankly makes this whole place uncomfortable beyond all reason.

I want to be anywhere but here right now.

"Ash." Amelia pokes me with the blunt end of her lance, getting my attention. "Search around the tents, see if you can find anything for the girls."

'Anything' being food and clothing, I assume. "Got it." I say, and head down to what is probably a supply tent…and then I feel a weight on my shoulder.

"What's that thing you have there?" Nowi asks from her perch on my shoulder.

"It's a weapon." I reply tonelessly. Nowi is really, really damn light for her size. Also that thing she's wearing is incredibly stiff; it feels like a metal plate pressing against my back. A soft, bendy metal plate.

"I've never seen a weapon like that before." Nowi mumbles.

I chuckle. "I suppose not; it's not the kind of thing that just appears in a thousand years."

Nowi squeezes my shoulders harder (which means I can now barely feel her hands).

"I had you pinned for someone interesting." Nowi whispers into my ears and gives me goosebumps because goddammit Nowi. "So are you an Outrealmer?" She asks normally.

…

"How did you come to that conclusion? Also, get off." I say after getting inside the tent. She hops off my back and helps me rummage through the bags for spare clothing and food.

At least that's what I think she's doing.

"Gear I've never seen before, built with an application of magic that I've never seen before…doesn't take a thousand years of experience to figure it out." She says lightly.

I am very not used to Serious!Nowi. She's actually throwing me off.

_To be fair Cherche already threw you off._

Well, yeah, that too. So I guess she's just feeding fuel to the throwing off fire.

_Whatever that means._

"Ooh, I found something interesting." Nowi clambers over a particular large bag for another one.

_We also get a very sustained view of her_

NO

_Dude, take a closer look without the influence of the internet._

…

"Hey! Give me a hand. My arms are puny." Nowi whines, and I…give her a hand pulling the bag of clothes free from its horribly jammed position. "Great!" Nowi beams as she hauls it over her head. "I'll get these to the other girls."

She then kind of…hops, out of the tent.

With the bag that she had issues pulling out before.

Y'know what, I'm too confused to care right now.

_Let's just look for stuff for the thirty-odd girls to eat. If anything else I don't think they get proper nutrition as a slave._

Well…I think they kind of should be, especially if they're trying to sell a girl; I mean, a good first impression is important when marketing a product, right?

…

I just bought a first class ticket to hell, wow.

_How many tickets is that now?_

…

…

_So, about that close look at Nowi._

Yeah…I didn't think she'd have that many scars on her body. It's…off-putting.

"Hey!" Nowi's already back from delivering the bag of clothing. "The bossy yellow haired lady wants to know if you found anything good to eat."

Bossy…Amelia is bossy?

"Not yet, still looking." I say from my position deep in the fortress of bags.

"Oh." Nowi sounds disheartened, before she jumps in again to help.

"So, you said something about being a Manakete."I say, casting around for a subject. I really want to ask about the scars on the back of her legs, but I'm a little terrified at what the answer might be.

"I did, didn't I? But I don't have my stone." She grumbles-slash-pouts. "Some baddies in black cloaks took them from me."

…The fact that she can switch from Playful!Nowi to Serious!Nowi at the drop of a hat is _really _disarming.

"And I'm guess they also captured you too, huh…" I sigh.

"Yep. I kicked their asses hard until then, though." Nowi said happily. "It took five guys to pin me down."

_…Wandering into deeply uncomfortable territory here._

"Pin you down?"

"I kept biting them." She said blithely. She then sighed. "In the end I agreed to play nice if they did."

That's…hardly reassuring.

"I saw those scars of yours. Are you sure you're ok?" I mean...I literally consider Nowi to be a baby sister of sorts, even if she out-ages me by, y'know, an entire millennia.

She turns and stares at me right in the eyes…those are the most pure, honest eyes I've ever seen. "Yep! I'm perfectly fine!" She says with a smile.

_She'd get along well with Nino._

There's something about that smile that hurts me though.

_It's probably just our paranoia._

"Uh, I'm sorry in advance." I say, holding up a hand.

"Huh?" Nowi cocks her head. "What-"

She doesn't get to finish her sentence because I felt the need to give her a hug. A glompy squeezy hug.

…

_We're very, very happy that she at least decided to hug back instead of, y'know, kicking us in the groin, which is the expected response._

She was also giggling a little manically so it wasn't nearly as touching as I hoped.

…

"You worry a lot, don't you?" Nowi asks happily when I finally break off the hug.

I frown. "Yes." Sometimes unnecessarily.

Nowi laughs. It's a very…loud. Sound. "You're a nice guy…if you smiled more." She says.

She then turns serious. "I don't want the bossy lady to yell at me. C'mon! We have to find that food!"

…

…

Amelia looks at us as we carry out these giant bags of…I hope its food, and not cured leather; the lighting in the tent is a bit dim. "That took you a while." She says, raising an eyebrow at me.

"It was a bit hard to find." I say, going through the bag. "It's preserved food, though."

Amelia shrugs. "Were you really expecting to find something else? C'mon, no time to waste." She helps us bring out the food (and water that Kellam found) to the ex-slaves.

…

…

"So." I hear a new voice I don't…oh, nevermind. It's the Anna. "What do you guys plan to do with us?" She says as she taps the sword embedded in the ground with her foot.

_While sitting on some crates._

We (Amelia, Us, Cordelia, Sumia, and Kyle) look at each other.

I think we've all just had the realization that we don't actually have any idea what the fuck we're supposed to do with a bunch of ex-slaves, beyond playing the hero and getting them out of slaver clutches.

"What are the odds of us escorting all of them back to town?" I ask. "Nevermind the issues that would come from that."

"Pretty bad; it would take far too long for us to put the wagons together." Cordelia says with a shrug. "We could ferry them by air instead."

That has its own issues.

Cordelia catches my eye and frowns. "Yes, I know that it's not a flawless solution."

"Did the slavers say what they where they were going?" I ask the girls in general.

Most of them remain mute, and the rest all have body language signaling "no" in some way, shape, or form.

…

_How many stories have we read?_

Well I'm a fucking idiot.

"Do we have a sentry? I feel like we need to have a sentry." I say, alarming the others unnecessarily.

"Why are you worried about that all of a sudden?" Amelia asks, looking around very quickly.

"He's paranoid!" Playful!Nowi declares cheerfully, with a "yeah!" fish pump into the air.

"Kyle, get in the air. Let us know if someone is coming." Cherche commands, and Kyle salutes and hurries off to his Wyvern. "Is that satisfactory, Sir Ash?" Cherche says with a smile.

Her calling me sir is just odd. "Yeah; thanks, Cherche."

"I don't see why that was so important right now." Amelia grumbles, "back on topic: if we take these girls back to civilization, what then?"

Uh…"We know that at least one of these girls was kidnapped, so they at least have family to go back to." I say slowly.

_The rest…we leave to die out on the streets? Leave them to be captured again? Doesn't seem like much of a rescue._

Ok, so what kinds of opportunities are there for a rescued slave? I mean, these girls seem like they were going to be sold just as trophies, so if they were to be reintegrated with society and, hell, assuming if they avoid being captured…what then?

_Can we do anything about it?_

The Shepherds are headed off into battle, and pretty much all of the air power is here. We can't spare the time or the resources to look after these girls, especially if Chrom or Robin…or anyone, really, ends up getting killed as a result.

_They can probably handle the next few chapters even if we're not around, y'know._

"Probably" won't cut it against Gangrel. If he's even half as good as I imagine him to be there's going to be a death count due to the battle, and if that happens then…well, I would restart the damn chapter.

I'm suddenly aware of Nowi being very very close to my face. "Ash? You're mumbling to yourself."

I pet her head. "Sorry; force of habit." I get a giggle in response.

_It's very hard to remain pensive in her presence._

"What's that all about?" Amelia asks with a raised eyebrow.

"Look at her; she reminds me of a cat." I say, resisting the urge to play with Nowi's hair.

_Doesn't that make us the cat though?_

"Nyaa!" Nowi says happily.

_Nyaa?_

A millennium is enough time to maybe visit Chon'sin for like a decade or so.

I'm not complaining; it's utterly adorable and makes me want to hug her forever and ever.

"Yeah, yeah…" Amelia shakes her head in despair. "Getting back on track _again_, what do we do?" She pointedly avoids looking at me and Nowi, because Nowi is sitting on my lap enjoying being petted like a cat.

_We enjoy petting her like a cat, too._

I'm not entirely sure what's going on at this point.

_Might be because she's technically a beast of some sort? Is that what dragons are?_

"Well, what do you lot have to say for yourselves?" Cordelia asks the ex-slave girls. "What are your desires?"

"I want to go home!" One of the girls says, and a lot of the other girls echo her sentiment moments later.

"I don't have a home to go back to." A particularly small girl in the back says quietly. Nowi jumps off of my lap and rushes to the little girl and gives her a warm hug.

_Hell, it was more of a glomp than just a hug._

"We can't just leave them, but if we don't, Chrom's side will be underpowered." I mutter.

"Even if we didn't take command of the camp, would you have been happy with just rescuing a handful of the slaves?" Cordelia asks in a tone that conveyed…a sense of disgust.

"Of course not, but we need to be realistic here." I sigh.

"Hate to break up the little party, but we have a problem." Gaius says, popping up from nowhere and sitting on top of a particularly high cage. "Plegian forces are coming in from that way." He says, pointing at the direction…where we launched our attack from. Great.

…

…

_You know what? Just do it._

"At least it can't get any worse." I say.

_We say with the biggest grin on our face._

"You just had to say it." Amelia growls.

I like her genre savviness.

Kyle flies down and lands next to us. "New group coming in from the northwest." He says, gesturing to the direction opposite of where Gaius said the Plegian army was.

"Let me guess, they're hostile." Amelia sighs.

Kyle nods a little sheepishly.

"Ash, I blame you for this." Amelia growls, pointing an accusing finger in my direction.

"Hey, we both knew it was going to happen." I shrug. "So can we force the two to fight each other?"

Kyle shakes his head. "Only if they're right on top of us."

"You think the northern group is a slavers group?" Cordelia sounds very shocked by that assumption of mine.

I turn to get her eye, just so I can roll mine. "Well, yeah, why else would they come out to the middle of fucking nowhere?"

"Banter later, battle plan now." Gaius warns. "If we go northeast we'll run closer to Feroxi territory, and if we go southwest we'll dive straight into the desert…that is, if we're running, which we should be."

"I guess we're going north then." Amelia sighs, checking her weapons almost subconsciously.

"We can defend this place." I say bluntly. "I mean, yeah, we don't really want to be defending right now, but…it's better than being chased."

"I find your enthusiasm wonderful." Cordelia says, with enough sarcasm to power small countries. "But we need to look at reality here."

"The reality is we're running out of time." Gaius practically shouts (while keeping his voice level).

"Yeah, yeah; Nowi, can you go look for some nails for me?" I unsling my rifle, and brace it against a particularly heavy set of boxes.

It's quite good that our gathering area is very close to the northwestern edge.

"You can't seriously expect to handle an entire slaver force by yourself…" Cordelia says disbelievingly.

"If we play our cards right, we don't have to; now use your eyes and look for targets." I say.

Cordelia frowns. "What kind of targets?"

"Targets of Opportunity." Amelia replies; I explained some stuff to her during the wagon trip, when she was off scout duty and felt like crashing in my wagon (which wasn't all too often). "He wants us to look for any stragglers and loners and then take them out."

"Well, ok, but…" I can feel Cordelia frown at me even though I'm not looking at her. "Why are we following his orders?"

"I see the first targets." I say, and bring out a set of four rods from my bag; the latest hardware upgrade to my rifle.

_Though they're just arrow shafts with a deep cut for the spell paper and a little bit of spirit dust mixed into the wood._

And they magnify the impact power at long distances without me actually needing to use more power or worry about the nail shattering midflight.

_Pity we never tested them beyond imagining what it can do; our design philosophy was literally "if the badly made nails can fly farther then they will explode harder."_

Well testing it is what we're doing now. "Gaius, get yourself higher and spot for me; I want someone with good eyes telling me if I hit something or not."

"Tricky, I'm a thief; I don't do this kind of distance." Gaius responds quickly.

_In retrospect he really should've called us Techy._

"I'll do it." Anna says and clambers onto the top of the slaver boss tent. "It's gonna cost you, though~" She adds almost as an afterthought.

"I'll charge you for my ammo then." I say while still taking aim.

"Jerk." Anna responds fairly jovially, and then I hear the sounds of wings behind me, denoting the fliers taking off.

"Can you really hit them from here?" Gaius couldn't help but ask.

"We're about to find out." I take a deep breath, and then pull the trigger.

_Because we sure as hell can't see them from here; too much glare._

…

[3rd person camera]

…

The slaver army stops short when the hillside they're descending suddenly explode in a shower of dust and sand.

…

[1st person camera]

…

Ooookay…that hit WAY harder than I thought it would. Correction: that nail exploded with way more force than I thought it would. Correction: I don't know what the hell happened but I certainly wasn't expecting an explosion of that size.

_Focus._

"Reloading; Anna, tell me if I hit anything and where I should be aiming next." I say.

"Got it; a little to your left."

How much is a little though?

"I got extra nails for you~!" Nowi says from behind me.

Judging by the clinking sound and Gaius's terrified gasp I'm afraid to actually look to see how she's carrying those things.

…

[3rd person camera]

…

Three shots later, and the slaver army is now suddenly very nonplussed and terrified by the fact that the hill they're descending is exploding on a disturbingly frequent basis, terrified enough to stop their advance toward the camp (as if the air units circling over their heads wasn't deterrent enough).

"What in the hells? You didn't tell us they had magic like this!" The slaver captain (A Paladin unit) snarled at the slaver boss, as another one of the unknown attacks exploded with the force of (though he doesn't know it) an artillery shell.

The slaver boss had no answer, because he was a little too shocked by the fact that the previous shot landed very, very close to him. Enough shock to freeze him in his steps, actually.

"Damn, so close. A little more to the right, Ashy boy!" Anna says with a laugh.

"How are your eyes that good?!" Ash demands and shifts his weight slightly. "Firing!"

"Shit. Fall back! Fall back!" The slaver captain roared as the ground beneath the slaver boss exploded, showering him with dirt and dust and killing the man immediately. "We're not fighting for free! Move it!"

…

[1st person camera]

…

I have to admit I was expecting them to stick around for longer than three or four shots.

_Five shots._

"That captain of theirs is pretty smart." Anna says approvingly, watching the slaver troops retreat up the hill.

"We're supposed to be happy about that?" I shake my head…wow, the add-on rails are actually smoking. That's a pretty bad sign.

"It means they won't move for a while now, at the very least." Anna laughs and jumps off of her perch. "That thing of yours is pretty interesting." She says, poking the rifle a little gingerly. "and a little hot."

"Yeah, I didn't plan that part out very well." It's…ow! I fired four shots and it's burning like I just shot…however many I did back in the chapter five map.

That doesn't bode well to my plans of scaling this weapon up for coastal defense…but I can work part that out in the next two years.

"What about the Plegians?" I ask, peering at where the Plegians were.

_Where you thought the Plegians were._

Gaius made some kind of arm signal toward the air and stared for a few seconds. "No movement so far from their ground forces."

Ground forces.

"So they have air units?" I ask, scanning the—OH DEAR GOD that's bright—the sky.

"Yep." Nowi says cheerily, waving to the sky. "They have four Wyvern riders in the sky."

…

"How can you tell?" I ask her.

"I just can." Nowi says with a wink.

_When Nowi's in her Playful mode that smile literally doesn't slide from her face._

Must be because she's a Manakete…come to think of it, those two Wyverns belonging to the slavers didn't want to take off either. Hmm.

And suddenly Amelia decided to drop down and land.

And I mean, suddenly; everyone jumped when her Pegasus hit the ground.

"Ash, the Plegian army wants to parley." Amelia says a little frantically.

_Did they say it three times?_

"Par…what?" More importantly, "How did they tell you that?"

"Uh…one of their wyvern riders did." Amelia says…a little distractedly? Did something happen?

"Well, it's not like we're in any shape to say no." Gaius says dully, surveying the camp. "Call back our fliers, and then let's sit down and talk."

"I can't believe you actually want to talk to Plegia." Amelia says vehemently.

_A little out of character for her, don't you think?_

"Amelia, we're trying to kill Gangrel. Not Plegia." I remind her with a raised eyebrow.

"Right, right." She says a bit distractedly...and a bit disbelievingly.

Huh.

…

...

So we (by which I mean Cherche) send the signal for Parley and the enemy…sorry, _Plegian_ _army_ march into the camp.

I'm really starting to have second thoughts…on the plus side, it's a pretty small army…can't be more than a hundred men.

And their leader is…

Oh.

Oh well.

Oh well, fuck.

…

You're about two chapters too early for me Mustafa.

…

Actually, never mind, this is pretty good. Mustafa only meets Chrom because he retreats out of Plegian territory in chapter ten. Given that we're doing the polar opposite of leaving Plegia…meeting Mustafa this early is a very, very good thing.

…or, rather, it would be if I had any cards to play…any card than my last one.

"I take it you are the leader of this little unit?" Mustafa asks Amelia in his Japanese-voice actor voice…deep and manly.

Judging by Amelia blinking rapidly she didn't exactly expect how utterly baritone his voice is. "Yes, I'm the company commander. Who might you be, if I may be so bold to ask?"

"General Mustafa, of the Plegian long range patrol." Mustafa says with a very regal bow, despite the fact that his armor is like literally cloth and spikes. "And you, fair lady, are…?"

Amelia hesitates. "Amelia of the Shepherds."

Oh dear lord Amelia. Why did you have to pick up the idiot ball now?!

As expected, Mustafa's guards (but not the man himself) are instantly on guard, and swords come out.

In response on our side, Gaius, Kellam and Anna all draw their swords as well.

_And we lift our rail gun to point it at the Plegian crowd; at this distance we'll kill like twenty people in a shot._

And then die because the extended rails will explode.

"At ease, men; we do not kill those who fight for the people." Mustafa says gruffly, and his men (reluctantly) sheathe their weapons. Our side does the same, because honestly it's 100 versus, like, five. "So why are the elite of Ylisse in Plegian lands?"

"We received a request from a civilian to help rescue his abducted child." I say quickly, before Amelia could use the power of absolute truth to utterly fuck us over. "And we're debating ways to get these girls—all of them—safely back to town." I stare into his eyes…ok, I stop staring into his eyes because they pierce souls. Yikes.

"I see…I hope you understand that these girls are Plegian citizens, and as the army of Plegia we cannot, in good conscience, let you leave with them." Mustafa says in a very "please understand" tone.

Hmm…

"Some nerve…Plegia doesn't seem to care all that much for its citizens then." Anna grumbles.

"I admit that we have had…failings, such as this." Mustafa bows his head slightly. "But believe me, at our heart we are every bit as humane as Ylisseans."

"We're better than they are, sir." One of his guards says proudly, to the agreement of the Plegian peanut gallery.

_Sad part is he's probably a bit right._

Well…generalizations are hard and often wrong.

"To be fair, they have a point." I say with a sigh. "We don't have the resources to ferry all these girls back to town; letting General Mustafa here take care of them is the best course of action."

"Ash, shut up." Cordelia says tersely. "I for one will not abandon refugees in need…that's not what the Shepherds are for."

Lady, I've been a Shepherd long than you.

_That is really, really odd, if you think about it._

I scowl. "The Shepherds are also not devoted to executing a single goal; we need to get our asses back to Chrom before the war effort goes sour." I hope she gets the hint. "Understand that we are in Plegia and therefore don't hold all the cards here, knight."

Cordelia bristles at the fact that I don't use her name.

"Looks like Sir Ash understand the importance of keeping your identities secret from your enemies." Mustafa says with a chuckle that sounds like it's coming from his gut. He then turns to the slaves, who by now more or less huddled into a group. "Rest assured, girls, we are honorable soldiers of Plegia; please put your faith in us."

His deep, deep baritone voice soothes the girls, at least a little bit, and one by one they nod hesitantly.

Note to self. Learn how to make that sexy, sexy baritone voice.

"Thank you." Mustafa bows deeply to the slaves, who didn't expect that, to say the least.

He then turns to me. "Now…you must be the Ash that Lord Gangrel has been so interested in."

…

Well, shit.

Thanks a lot, Cordelia.

"Interesting how?" I ask, tensing up for a fight.

"Gangrel has shown a remarkable amount of interest in you and your…power." Mustafa says sadly. "We have orders to capture anyone named Ash on sight, with force, if need be…fortunately, you are the only one with such a name."

_How very fortunate indeed._

"First off, Cordelia, I blame you for this." I grumble. "Second, I don't see how my capture can be good for either side."

I don't see Cordelia's reaction since she's behind me but by god I hope she's at least embarrassed.

"Unforunately, we are sworn to follow our liege." Mustafa agrees. "If you resist, we will take you by force."

…Welp, trump card time.

"Yeah, it's not like he has your families watched or anything." I say as offhandedly casual as I can possibly manage.

Mustafa, praise the sun, narrows his eyes. "I see…so the rumors were true. Ylisse is planning to kill Gangrel."

Lol, planning.

_Mustafa's statement drew a lot of alert from his men and nearly caused Kellam to draw his sword, which would've ended very, very badly for us._

"All your men are loyal to you, right?" I ask.

"They are my handpicked elites." Mustafa growls.

Yes! "Good; then I have a preposition for you."

He hefts his giant axe… I really regret leaving my chain greatsword in the caravan now.

I built it FOR THIS MOMENT (besides the other moment with Gangrel) and I don't have it.

"Whatever you have to say, it better be good." Note to self: Mustafa is a papa bear. Don't even hint at threatening his family. Or let him think that you're threatening his family.

Here goes nothing. "Drag your feet a little."

He blinks in surprise. "What?"

"I'm asking you to be just a little late on the uptake when it comes to our movements in Plegia." I clarify.

"And in return?" His…growl is terrifying. It literally feels like I'm facing down a bear.

"In return…your family will be safe; the families of your men, too, probably. I can't see Gangrel having anything against them."

His axe head, mercifully, drops back into the ground. "That…is an interesting set of conditions. You are asking us soldiers to directly disobey orders."

I think for a little (head tilt included), "not exactly. I'm asking you to pay your allegiance to the crown."

Mustafa stops short and then smirks. "Sly one, aren't you…Gangrel hasn't been good to Plegia, and you know this, I take it."

I sigh, and gesture at the girls. "Doesn't take a genius to figure that out."

"Wait, what…" Amelia starts to ask, and I hold up a hand to keep her quiet.

"Actually, it would be even better…for all parties involved, if you could step into the scene after Gangrel dies…and maybe stay in it for a few months." I say.

THAT gets murmurs from his men. Very confused murmurs, so I don't think they actually knew what the hell I was talking about.

"You are asking a lot of me, for what is effectively an unenforceable promise, Sir Ash." Mustafa says finally. I think he understood what I was hinting at, given how large his eyes got.

"Believe me, if I was in a different position, I wouldn't be trying to put you in this kind of situation." I laugh shakily. "But as things are…well, if I'm pretty well known then me showing up in Plegia wouldn't be good for you."

Mustafa chuckles. "Gangrel was right to have his eyes on you…I assume you have things planned out already?"

I frown. "I have laid the groundwork; assuming that nothing goes wrong with your current mission, that plan should pay off nicely in the future."

By now, I would like to add, we have confused the hell out of everybody watching (everybody except maybe Nowi and Anna).

Mustafa shakes his head. "It's the best deal I've seen so far. Men!" He suddenly yells, making everyone jump. "We will be preparing the recovered Plegian citizenry for their trip back home!"

His men give a rather confused (but still hearty) cheer.

"Captains, look to your squads; we will start by assembling wagons; make extra sure they are secured."

"Thank you, Mercenaries of Ferox." Mustafa continues to say in a slightly over loud voice. "For showing compassion to those unrelated to the fight; as a reward, Plegia would like to allow you to leave these lands and never come back."

Amelia opens her mouth, but I shut her up again.

"Get to it!" Mustafa finishes, and his men disperse to do their thing. "I will send a messenger when the sun is down, because it is quite nice at dusk." Mustafa says in an undertone to me. "Now go!"

"Thank you, General of Plegia." I theatrically bow. "Alright, ladies! We're moving out!" I then tap Anna and Nowi on the shoulder. "You two as well."

They dutifully fall in line as we saddle up in the 3 Pegasi and 2 Wyverns and take off into the sky.

_With different seating arrangements, too._

"What the hell was that all about, Ash?!" Amelia demands as soon as we get into the air.

"Explain later, damage control now." I say back. "Look for anyone running away from the camp."

"What? Fine." Amelia growls, scanning the ground with me. "I see one." She says, pointing to a figure running across the dust as fast as he can go.

"Let's go. We need to stop this thing from failing before it begins."

She gets my intent and swoops down to the...ok nevermind we're not swooping down because dude in cloak just tried to burn our faces off.

"I guess we know what he's up to." I growl and level the rail gun.

…

And then watch as Cherche does a super low fly by and literally blow the guy to the ground with just air pressure.

And…I gotta say…hitting a target on the ground is a lot easier than a target that's moving, dodging, and trying to shoot back.

"Ok, looks like we're in the clear." I call to Amelia (though she's behind me).

"Yeah." She does some signal with her arm, and we fly off towards the south-south-west.

_How can you tell?_

North is the other way. I think.

_We're really bad with compass directions. So how can you tell? I don't see any landmarks._

Just take my word for it, brain, _god._

…

[Nearly Dusk]

…

After a really tiring flight (largely because NOTHING OF INTEREST HAPPENED FOR SEVERAL HOURS; we didn't even break for food) we find a Pegasus Knight flying circles fairly low in the sky. When she saw us coming she made some sort of signal, and the camp underneath her fired a purple flare into the air.

_Nothing happened because we were flying low in order to avoid detection, now quit complaining._

…

"Welcome back; how was your trip?" Robin asks me once we've all landed.

_Why you and not Amelia?_

Because Amelia and the rest of the air units are busy caring for their mounts, namely, getting them huge amounts of water; judging by a quick glance around the camp nothing serious had happened so far.

_Our entire reasoning is based around the fact that Robin, at least, seems happy._

"Rewarding, though I think we failed our primary objective." I sigh, and earn a scowl from Robin.

"Explain." She commands.

.

.

.

{ === + === }

Author Notes:

Wow this took a while.

_And it wasn't even all that good._


	15. From - Beginning Of Chapter 11?

"Ugh, well. At least they're safe with him, if you trust him that much." Robin grumbles after I exposition our side of the story at her.

_I don't think that's how you use that word._

It is now. "Yeah, Mustafa's a reasonable guy; at the very least we got that going for us…how was it on your end?" I ask her.

Robin kicks a rock. "Not bad, not good." She stares off into a direction behind her. "I underestimated the Grimleal's presence around here; one of the local villagers ratted us out to a detachment."

And judging by the fact that you are standing I assume you won. "So…what, are you worried about more of them showing up?"

She glares at me. "Not worried." She clarifies. "I know pursuers are coming, so I'm not worried."

…

That is the worst reasoning for not being worried I think I've ever heard of.

"I'm worried about what's going to happen if they get us, though." Robin admits. "Fortunately the local Grimleal presence isn't very well trained."

How nice. "What are we doing now, then?"

"Sleep through the night; we're double-timing it in the morning." She flips through the book she's carrying in her hand. "I don't believe Plegia is a natural desert, but I'm treating it as one for now."

_So it gets really hot during the day and really cold during the night. Got it._

It wasn't all that hot while we conducted our operation during the day though.

…

…

Regardless, I've just been dismissed and there's about an hour before bedtime. And I have nothing to do…I? I need to get my sword back.

…

Oh shit.

…

"Hey, what's this?" Nowi asks as she lifts my chain greatsword over her head in a precarious "I'm going to drop this on my own head" kind of way.

_Commence operation de-weaponize Nowi!_

"It's a weapon, it's a weapon! Put it down before you cut yourself with it." Operation success! She's now no longer holding the weapon.

She pouts. "You don't trust me with weapons?"

"I don't trust you with sharp objects." I mutter, and get a kick for my trouble.

"Jerk! You of all people should know that I'm far older than you." Nowi proudly declares.

I roll my eyes. "I'll believe it when I see it." And then I pet her on her head.

…and she calms down surprisingly quickly. I guess it is because she's technically a beast.

_That doesn't make sense to me._

"See?" I say, not being able to help myself.

"Meanie." Nowi grumbles, tossing my hand from her head.

Let's see, back on track…spooling up weapon.

…

Cool, it didn't explode.

"What are you doing?" Nowi asks over the gentle hum of the sword's chain.

"Testing it." I say as I channel some more magic into the spell papers within the rocket motors.

_The rocket motors come to life with a whine and Nowi's eyes just lit up with excitement at the sound._

"That sounds like fun! Gimme! Gimme!" She says while bouncing on her feet like a goddamned rabbit.

_We ignore her._

Test finished, all parts appear to be operating normally. We have also angered Nowi and now she is pouting and not speaking to us.

Thank. God.

…

…

…

The night passed without a whole lot of fanfare. Not even the glowing eyes of doom showed up, which was interesting.

_We spent the night alone in our wagon with the supplies._

…

…

Nothing else of major importance happened while we waited for the sun to come up some, and so when the time came we left from our camp in the middle of god knows where (less camp and more "wait it out in the wagons") off to…

Actually where the fuck are we going

…

"We're headed towards the major supply lines of the Plegian army." Robin answers when I go to ask her.

Even though the wagons are moving quickly, they're not going that much faster (for fear of breaking equipment) so we can run between wagons reasonably easily enough if we're fast about it.

_We crawl into Robin's wagon; there's not enough room to stand. Besides, standing in a moving vehicle without handrails is dangerous._

Robin is sitting in her wagon, surrounded by books and small maps. She has a larger map nailed to a piece of wood propped against the front of the covered wagon. "See here?" She gestures over an area on the map. "This is where we think their supply convoys congregate, and so we're hitting that first."

I frown. "We're not immediately going after Gangrel?"

She shakes her head slightly. "Gangrel crawled to the top of the Plegian court despite its backstabbing, assassinations, and petty politics…he knows we're coming, even if he doesn't actually have any concrete information."

That's…that's a good point. The only way he would not see us coming is if some Plegian nobles want him dead and purposefully withheld the fact that 100% of Plegia's land touches enemy territory (and dear god Gangrel would be an idiot if he bought that).

…

Actually, why _is _Plegia ignoring their northern border? Besides the fact that Mustafa was there, but then his detachment was too small to actually patrol the entire goddamn border.

_Feroxi is a large place too, y'know?_

"Did…"

Robin looks at me.

"Did Ferox openly declare war on Plegia?" I'm not sure why this worries me.

Robin thinks it over. "Not really? Ferox is ruled by a collective of Khans, and I'm pretty sure Basilio and Flavia told nobody else when they rounded up their troops and marched to help us..."

Despite their status as Great Khans?

_A major problem with pre-radio nations is the lag time between communications, y'know._

It wouldn't be a surprise if the khans were used to taking unilateral action, huh…

Robin taps the map, thinking hard. "What are you implying, Ash?"

I… "Honestly? nothing. It just seems strange that Plegia _and _Ferox didn't care at all about their touching borders, even if the terrain is bad. I mean… we crossed the borders and there was literally no resistance, besides the Grim…" wait.

_In game, Plegia's troops were devoted to fighting Feroxi troops at the Ylissean border._

In reality, no nation worth its salt would send all of its troops and then leave the BIGGER BORDER undefended, unless they were inviting an invasion…

…

Oh.

Oh, hell no.

…

"Fucking. Grimleal!" I snarl.

Robin seemed to have come to a similar conclusion I did. "The less secured Plegia's borders are, the more damage their nation will take…but why are they doing this?"

…

Alright, so I went a little further than she did, due to Outsider cheating.

"Grima's resurrection is fueled by death, the more the better. Fuck." I can't help but grin sadly. "They really thought this one out."

"Pretend I'm stupid." Robin orders.

I nod. "With an exposed northern border, Plegia's enemies—like us—have free reign into the country, we travel around, hit key targets, and undermine the people's trust of the Plegian crown."

Hell, the ones coming into the country is not just us; bandits, mercenaries, anyone…everyone.

"Oh shit." Robin breathes. "And when we kill their king the Grimleal will fill the power vacuum."

Well, they will try to.

_And then the Generals will step in, being fueled by their own desire for power…_

"Yeah…and then…" I take a deep breath, because fucking hell we got played hard. "The Grimleal plays the public and whatever powers that rises, and spreads some more panic, destruction…making it that much easier to get their god back."

"Damn." Robin seethed. "I seriously hope we're wrong here, I really do."

"Makes the two of us." I gulp. Please, for the love of every god in existence.

Tell me I'm just being paranoid.

…

"Ash, are you ok?" Chrom asks me worriedly as I jump out of Robin's command wagon (and stumble a little because the wagon is moving) and pass by his.

"Yeah, yeah, just…the gravity of what we're planning to do just hit me." I say, with a comparatively higher voice than normal.

_We step onto Chrom's wagon because fuck carrying a conversation while jogging._

Chrom frowns. "What did Robin say?"

I shake my head. "I blame myself for this." I mutter, and head back into my wagon.

My _personal _wagon.

_Our personal wagon that we share with spare equipment._

…

Our personal wagon that seems to have a small something sleeping in it.

"Nowi, what are you doing here?"

"Maribelle kicked me out." Nowi said happily.

I bury my face into my hands. "Oh god Robin put you with Maribelle?"

"Yep!" Nowi lays back down. She even brought a blanket and sheets.

"And you even brought your sleeping things because…" It's worth mentioning that right now I'm standing on the threshold of my wagon and feeling the desire to blame the wagon driver for letting her in to begin with.

"Because you make me feel comfortable." Nowi says without a _shred _of embarrassment.

Uh…I…huh.

Ok, you know what? I'm not going to fight her over this.

"Fine, fine…just don't touch my stuff; I want to have a place to sleep at night." I crawl into the wagon and sit in my blanket-reinforced sitting place.

"Haaaai~"

…

[Noon]

…

It's…VERY. Hot.

_Nowi has melted into the wagon floor, while complaining incessantly about the heat._

…

[Afternoon]

…

Ugh…problem with wagon travel: you know its morning when you hit your head on something.

Ow ow ow ow…ok, I'm up…I guess I dozed off or got heatstroke, but either way, I'm up.

…

Well, I guess I knew this was going to happen at some point.

"How bold." Lissa giggles as she stares at Nowi curled up next to me.

_It's very lucky that she didn't climb on us._

I guess that was kind of hard or something.

"Yeah, yeah…we need to talk to Robin about her scheduling tendencies." I rub my head. "So why are you here?"

"Robin wanted to talk to you as soon as you woke up." Lissa says happily.

_What if Nowi and Lissa both took a shot of caffeine and then saw a box of kittens?_

Then they would generate enough happiness energy to power the universe forever. "And how long have you been watching me?"

"About five minutes." Lissa says matter-of-factly. "Come to Robin's wagon when you're ready."

She then hops out of the wagon.

The fact that we're constantly moving around amongst MOVING WAGONS is probably doing wonders for our leg strength.

I sigh, and then impulsively pet Nowi's head…

…Is she shivering? In THIS heat?

She sounds like she's mumbling in her sleep.

…

_Yeah, because someone who's lived for over a millennia has never seen any kind of trauma-inducing events ever._

Hm.

_We cover her with a blanket and hop out of the wagon._

Good thing these wagons move at the speed of jogging.

…

…

I hop into Robin's wagon. "You called, Robin?"

Oh look, it's Robin, Chrom, Lissa, and…Cherche?

Huh.

"About time you showed up." Robin says as she scribbles into her notebook. That thing must be full by now. "Remember what we talked about yesterday?"

Oh boy. "About how the Grimleal gives zero fucks about its peasantry? Yeah, I remember; what's up?"

_Lissa raises an eyebrow at how oddly vehement we're being._

"Good. We've" Robin points to Chrom with her quill "decided to continue with the mission anyways."

Uh…really now.

I stare at Chrom, who shrugs. "If the Grimleal are so heartless as to harm their own citizenry, then the sooner we reveal them for what they are, the better."

This is…this is not going to work. Like, at all.

"Ash, one step at a time." Robin says softly.

_In other words, Gangrel is the more immediate threat._

Sigh. "Yeah…so what's going on now?"

Robin taps her wagon map. "I sent Sumia and Cordelia out to scout earlier, and they've found two Plegian military sites."

Earlier this…"The sun just barely came up!"

Robin ignores me. "One of them is a Plegian garrison, and the other is a supply convoy."

I make a T with my hands. "Time out: if we strike any of them Plegia will definitively know that we're here."

Robin nods. "Right."

"Just thought I'd clear that up." I resist the urge to facepalm.

_It's Robin, she has something in mind._

She clears her throat. "We will split into two attack groups, though I'm not yet sure on the unit composition; Group One will strike and delay the Garrison, and Group Two will strike and commandeer the supply convoy."

What is there to think about for unit composition? Air units go to the garrison and the wagons merge with the supply line.

"With this attack, either of the two locations should be able to send out a messenger."

Ooh…I see.

I like it.

Robin notices the smile creeping onto my face. "As you can guess, the pivotal question is if we can hit and control the convoy before the garrison breaks out of the attack."

Chrom chips in. "If our timing is off, it jeopardizes the entire mission."

"And thus my dilemma." Robin nods.

"What's there to think about?" I say nonchalantly. "The fliers will hit the garrison and the wagons will merge with the supply convoy. Even if the disguise fails it'll get you close enough for our infantry-centric unit to do its thing."

"So I thought, but we can't hold the garrison off with just our air units." Robin says.

"Robin, give me enough time, a knife, and some spare arrows, and I will lock that garrison down."

The four of them look at me.

"I'll take your word for it." Robin rolls her eyes and then does a double take. "Actually, if you're that confident…can we just send you and an escort?"

Uh. Hmm.

"Thinking it over." I mutter.

If I fuck up everyone dies.

_No pressure._

The rail gun extenders drastically increase firepower per nail, but I don't know how much spirit dust it consumes as a side effect. Normally the rail gun eats either none or preciously little, but…

_If we make multiple extenders and carry them we should have no problems firing from a mounted position._

"I'll need some time to practice?" I say hopefully.

"Robin. It might be more prudent to send all of our air units, just in case." Chrom says.

_Lissa, for the record, is getting bored._

"I'm well aware of both this mission's importance…and the fact that Ash's weapons are critically destructive; the less manpower we spend unnecessarily, the better." Robin says firmly.

_That's a vote of confidence if we've ever seen one._

"Alright; I'll let you know after I've done some trials." I crouch up; not much head room in the wagons. "Just in case, though…"

"I'll have the secondary units planned." Robin promises.

…

…

While we were speaking, our wagons slowed and gradually came to a stop next to a small oasis.

Plegia's just full of these things, aren't they.

…

Ok, test runs, test runs…

"Amelia, I got a favor."

Amelia pauses, and then continues to adjust the harness on her Pegasus. "Yeah? What do you need, Ash?"

"Well…"

…

…

"Sure, I can do that…why can't you just stay on the ground though?" Amelia says after I filled her in on the situation.

"I don't know if the fortress only has a single entrance, and I don't feel like finding out the hard way."

She nods. "Alright, I'll be ready in a moment."

…

…

Ok, that's that. Now then…let's make…

Ah ha. This'll do fine.

I cut off some of the lower branches of nearby shrubbery…a lot of lower branches, actually, and then toss them haphazardly into a pile a fair distance away from the wagons.

_Robin's briefing the rest of the Shepherds on the operation back at base._

I exhale. "Ok, that looks good…let's do this."

…

…

"What's your idea of practice, anyways?" Lissa asks me as I hop onto Amelia's Pegasus.

"Eh…something something." I say distractedly…Amelia's wearing perfume.

_Correlation implying causation?_

Maybe. "Ok, Amelia, let's go."

Before Lissa can get a word in, Amelia kicks off into the air, and we fly towards the pile of shrub greens out against the desert.

…

"How high should I be flying?" Amelia asks once she slows down to hover in midair.

"As high as you need to avoid getting shot." I answer back, and Amelia oh holy shit we're high up.

Getting some mild vertigo now. That target is also really, really small… I could've made it bigger, I guess.

How many shots do I have? Twenty.

"Alright, now start." I command.

…

Amelia begins flying in a large circle around the "target".

Alright…put it in my sights…

And…

_Fvoom~_

"Whoa!" Amelia's Pegasus recoils in surprise and nearly tosses me off of her back.

_The shot, meanwhile, missed the target by a good five, six feet. That's almost two meters off the mark._

I can't tell if I hit it from up here. Continue firing.

…

After Amelia has regained control of her Pegasus.

…

…

Five shots in, her Pegasus has gotten used to the sudden jolt that I never registered whenever I pull the trigger.

Ten shots, it's flying smoother than before to help with my aim.

…

…

"Test finished?" Amelia asks after I tap her on the shoulder.

_Coming to a hovering stop again, of course._

Except we're a lot higher up so she's actually yelling.

"Get us down." I say. Amelia nods and brings her Pegasus to the ground, next to the target.

…

Lessee…

The ground here is dirt, not sand, and I used wood pieces instead of nails, so my aim is naturally a bit off…

But overall, with wood, I made exactly zero hits out of twenty shots. As far as I can see the target isn't disturbed at all.

"Well, shit." Operation "Pretend to be an AC-130" didn't go over so well.

…

"So?" Amelia asks after I stand over the shrubbery target a little too long.

"This…might need a little work." I sigh.

Well, what did I learn?

I learned that a Pegasus circling above a target doesn't need a lot of compensating for a change in lateral distance. There still is a little bit of delta-x, but I think I have it reasonably figured out.

_The problem here is the size of the fortress; it might take too long for Amelia to circle around it safely and effectively, which would immediately invalidate this entire strategy._

Yeah…damn.

Hmm.

I can see why Robin was having trouble with unit composition.

I…wish I built a second gun now, not gonna lie.

"Having some trouble?" Amelia asks lightly.

"Somewhat." I grin sheepishly. "I wish I was a little better prepared this time."

"Would a faster mount help?" Amelia wonders. "I mean…if our job is to invalidate the garrison's ability to strike, then we just need to be faster than they are."

…

Huh.

"What do you have in mind?" I ask her.

…

So as it turns out what she had in mind was to get Cherche to fly me in instead, because, as she puts it, "Cherche flies like a maniac."

I'm not exactly sure how that's supposed to make me feel reassured about the mission.

Either way, Cherche was present during the briefing, so she knows (on a general level) what I'm trying to accomplish…point being, I guess it can work.

Well…never hurts to ask.

…

"I see." Cherche says after I consult her. "While Minerva is fast, I'm not quite sure if speed is what you're looking for with an operation like this."

_Well the window in which we can attack and still see where we're going isn't getting any bigger._

"Plan A isn't going to work because I don't know how large the fortress is." I say. "So I'm going with Plan B, and that is to quickly fly around the fortress and shut down every entrance before they realize what's going on."

She cocks her head. "Surely, that fortress will have a garrison of flying units, and they will deploy to meet us in the air..."

Er…

_That's a good point._

"I might need to yell at Robin about this." I mutter.

"Don't bother." Robin says from behind me. "I know how rushed this is, but we don't have enough leeway to wait around for better opportunities; we need to start the attack very soon, so get your plan ready."

Uh…well, shit.

_Maybe we're forgetting the fact that we are still operating in enemy territory?_

"So…" Cherche starts to ask uncertainly.

"Dammit…it's a risk we're just going to have to take." I hope I'm thinking through this correctly.

Cherche looks at me doubtfully.

"As you wish." She says after a moment, and goes to check Minerva's rigging.

_We need to make our extenders._

Yeah.

…

[Start of Operation "Why are we doing this"]

…

"Ready, Ash?" Robin asks me.

"Just about." I have a quiver of range extenders, and about ten minutes of training putting them on and taking them off.

Given by the fact that these things more or less catch on fire after a few shots, I'm probably going to be changing them every two shots, tops.

Figuring out how to do that while mounted is going to be _fun._

"Alright, good luck." Robin claps me on the shoulder. "Don't get all of us killed."

_No pressure._

_…_

Now, I'm not saying that Robin's tactics are bad.

…

But fuck I seriously hope this wasn't just an on-a-whim situation.

"Ash? Are you feeling alright?" Cherche asks me, and I become aware that I've been standing still and spacing out for the past few seconds.

I shake my head slightly. "Yeah, let's do this."

…

Ok, so I might not have thought this through in its entirety.

Namely, the part where Cherche isn't wearing anything on her back.

_A little bit off-putting for us, who has to HOLD ON TO HER during flight._

Yeah, speaking of which, how are we flying a two-seater wyvern? I saw Cherche put a spare seat on Minerva…and that seat seems to have extra rigging around the foot areas.

"Based on what you've said, I assumed that you have no experience riding a Wyvern." Cherche says with her smile. "Thus I added extra supports for you."

Uh… "Thanks…I can stand up within that rigging, right?"

She nods. "Yes; not to sound rude, but having you holding on to me to maintain your balance would hamper my ability to fly correctly."

I shrug. "Make sense." And hop into the s…eat.

This reminds me very vaguely of a motorcycle.

Cherche mounts Minerva, her poleaxe in her hand. "Alright…here we go!"

…

FUUUUUUUUUU

I AM NOT LIKING THIS RAPID CHANGE IN HEIGHT

AAAAAAAAAAAAAA

_At least we're not screaming out loud; Minerva kicked off of the ground with an astounding force and sent dust and dirt everywhere, and Cherche pulled us into a near-vertical climb, until we hit some pre-determined height, where she levelled off._

_Given by the fact that Minerva almost rolled I assume that's what usually would happen. As in, Minerva would roll into a level flight._

We would lose all of our extenders had she rolled, so kudos to Cherche for catching on and not making my heart explode.

Like, holy shit Wyverns are fast. The only thing I can hear is the wind whistling past my ears.

_And the only thing we can see or feel is Cherche's hair hitting our face._

Her weird hair decoration thing actually keeps her hair from flying around like goddamn Medusa, but right now all they're doing is slapping me in the face.

…

…

After…oh, some time of flight, which makes me wish I had a watch, Cherche suddenly banks and I see the fortress we're targeting.

Judging by the look of things…it's an open air fortress. Yay.

Cherche slows down to the point where I can hear her talk over the wind. "What do you do now?"

"Find the entrance!" I ready my rifle and attach a set of extenders.

"At once." Cherche says and HOLY MOTHER OF GOD

_Cherche accelerates by diving towards the fortress in conjunction with Minerva's muscles._

_Once we reach a close enough distance to the fortress, Cherche banks again and proceeds to fly a circle around the fortress._

Which gives the fort enough time to raise an alarm.

Also, as our luck states the fort entrance is literally at the last wall we checked.

The entire fortress is shaped like the Fort icons in the game, only, y'know, big.

Also fuck their archers are waking up.

_Cherche sees the entrance to the fortress and turns sharply to fly straight at the entrance._

My time to shine. I stand up, brace my legs against the extra rigging, aim, and…

_Fvoom~_

The force of the shot kicks the rifle up high and the rifle literally kicks us out of the seat and into the ground, extra rigging be damned.

_We hit the ground and roll roughly to a stop; the only reason why our legs weren't broken by the landing was because of the recoil from the rifle._

Ok…that wasn't what I thought would happen.

Also…every part of my body hurts.

_Cherche did notice the rapid change in weight, but didn't have much choice but to pull steeply into a climb to avoid slamming into the fortress walls._

While being followed by sporadic enemy archer fire.

Let's see…yeah, the extenders fell out of the quiver. I have two sets left.

"Fuck it, let's do this." I snarl, and brace myself the best I can (because like a fucking idiot I opted to leave the stand behind).

…

[3rd person camera]

…

Cherche heard a loud boom as a second shot from Ash's rifle impacted the ground near the Fortress gate, covering it in a choking cloud of dust and dirt.

_Why isn't he targeting the Fortress itself?_ Cherche wondered as Minvera spiraled into the air, dodging arrows and spells targeted into the air.

Minerva's growl brings Cherche out of her thoughts and brings her focus toward the center courtyard of the fortress, where a handful of Wyvern riders scramble to their mounts.

"About time." Cherche says with an uncharacteristically vicious smile on her face.

The Wyverns kick off from the ground, and with loud roars they zoom into the air, intent on chasing down Cherche.

Cherche, on the other hand, slaps Minvera's side, and the Wyvern lazily flips once in the sky, before focusing her eyes on the Wyverns coming to meet her.

The Plegian Wyvern riders heard a roar from above them moments before their would-be target streaked past, cutting down two of their riders in one swing.

…

[1st person camera]

…

Cherche is actually kind of insane in the air.

She literally aimed Minerva's nose straight down and just blasted straight through her attackers.

…

Meanwhile, No enemy troops seem to be coming out of the main gate.

Does that mean there was a sallying exit I missed somewhere?

Activating wind shoes…no, not activating wind shoes. My legs can't support my weight right now.

One little miscalculation. Literally one little miscalculation screwed me over right now.

…Wait.

_There are horses coming from the right side of the fortress._

A bit of a stretch: I can see a cloud of dust on the right side of the fortress, I assume it's being made by horses because if that's an infantry army then good god is it a fucking huge army.

So what should I do?

I don't have the ammo for an extended operation. I don't have the mobility to move from this position either…

_We can always keep our heads down and hide._

Hide…right. Like that's a possibility.

Dammit. Literally, if I braced with my legs a bit harder on my first shot we wouldn't be in this situation.

_We still would; the rigging actually broke._

Alright…I guess the only thing I can do is to stay put until my legs can support my weight again.

…

Ahahaha like that's a possibility under these conditions.

_We're looking through our rail gun scope._

That is indeed a cavalry division. Not only that, a light cavalry division…when comparing this bunch with the Plegian Heavy Cavalry from before, these guys have almost zero armor.

_Perfect for patrolling a hot province…_

…

Oh, shit. Did Robin just get pre-empted?

I feel a shower of dust and dirt hit me as Cherche land heavily next to me.

_Not really next to us, but she landed with enough force to kick a lot of earth in our general direction._

"Ash! Are you alright?!" She asks as Minerva runs toward me.

I know she's on my side but good god is that terrifying.

"Yeah, my legs are shot though." It's really fortunate that they're not obviously bleeding or anything though.

"I see, hold on." Minerva walks up to me and Cherche literally picks me up like a goddamn ragdoll and then I'm seated on Minerva in front of her. "What do we do now?" She asks.

_Cherche is peering at the cavalry cloud with worry._

"Can we take off? We need to get the hell out of here."

"Our landing was a little forced." Cherche said with a barest hint of sadness. "It's going to take Minerva a little while before she can lift off again."

Just one thing after another, isn't it? "Fine, then let's run."

"A Wyvern can't match a horse on the ground for very long."

"She doesn't have to; we just need breathing room. Damn." The cavalry cloud has picked up speed.

_Even better, the fortress soldiers have sallied as well, streaming out of the front gate. Pegasus Knights from within the fortress have taken into the air, too._

…

"Cherche, I apologize in advance for this."

"What are you talking abou-"

Cherche abruptly stops talking because I'm now using her as a brace.

_With our head resting against her armor's chest piece._

"Minerva! Dig your claws in and keep your head down!" I yell.

Minerva growls and complies as I take aim and squeeze the trigger.

_The shot hits the cavalry cloud, scattering horses and men everywhere (largely due to shock rather than any sort of direct hit)._

"Ok, gogogo!"

Cherche doesn't say anything, and Minerva drives herself away from the fortress on foot, running at a fairly leisurely pace.

…

…

They're not going to leave us alone, are they?

_For the past minute we've been running with the enemy Pegasus knights flying above our heads._

"Cherche, got any ideas?" I ask, after craning my neck to look at the enemy knights for like the billionth time.

_Good thing Minerva drives herself._

"Unfortunately not." Cherche says sadly.

If we stop, they'll kill us. Probably.

If we fly, they'll kill us. If we keep running, we'll lead them right to Robin's group or die in the desert.

…

More importantly, Robin's attack plan on the fortress was…predicted. It can't have been intercepted because it literally was a spur-of-the-moment attack.

_Implying that someone knew she was going to do exactly this._

Oh…man. I'm not liking this one bit.

_On the plus side, our legs feel better._

"The world is about to end, but the good news is I just saved a bunch of money on my car insurance." Yeesh.

…

Uhm?

_There's a weird tingly feeling down our back._

…

"Minerva, hard right." Cherche says firmly, and Minerva jumps to her right…

Right as a thunderbolt from the sky struck where we were going to be.

"Siege tomes…so Plegia brought them out after all." Cherche sounds impressively scary.

Also. "Only Plegia has them?"

"For as long as I can remember." Cherche says…she's concentrating really hard.

I hear a woosh over my head and look up instinctively.

Three air units. A Dark Flyer and two Wyvern knights flew over our head before turning to land in front of us.

Minerva stops with a growl, which the two other Wyverns return.

"See? They're nothing special, after all." One man…oh. Oh hell no. One man says as he deftly hops down from his Wyvern.

"Not bad, strategist." The Dark Flier…what's her name. I don't even remember. Says.

"Oh, dear." Cherche mutters.

"Yeah." I breathe.

_The Pegasus knights that were tailing us the entire time land in a loose circle around us; archers that we didn't see riding with the knights dismount and face us._

This? This is a terrible situation to be in.

_This is what we would call a situation snowballing out of control._

"Now then, Ash…" The man says, throwing back his hood to reveal a head of blindingly white hair and a devious smile.

"Fucking. Hell." We are so, SO boned.

"Well, I wouldn't go that far." Male!Robin laughs. "It's been a while, buddy."

.

.

.

{ === + === }

Author Notes:

Have a merry holiday!

And if you get bent out of shape on holiday political correctness...then you're probably not doing the whole "peace love and understanding" thing right.

hehe~


	16. Arc One Finale (Part One)

"I don't know about this whole buddy business." I say slowly. "I don't think surrounding your buddies with archers is a good first greeting."

Male!Robin keeps grinning. "Well, I like being insured."

"Do you know him?" Cherche asks me in a low voice.

"In a different time, in a different space." Male!Robin answers…he's got sharp ears.

…

…

…

Well, this is new.

Male!Robin is just circling around us and grinning.

Cherche is scowling at the ring of archers.

_And we're just panicking._

So there's been nothing but the sound of MRobin's footsteps for the past few minutes.

I don't know what's going on. I don't want to ask because that puts me at a disadvantage. I'm sure Cherche is just looking for a way out of this miserable situation.

"As cautious as always, I see." MRobin finally says, after circling around us like three times. "Even though you have no idea why I'm here."

"Darn." I say evenly. "I wish you didn't find that out." I sound a lot calmer than I feel.

_There is a slight waver in our voice, so no, we don't even sound calm._

"You're not nearly as careful as you think." MRobin smirks. "Which is why you are here, you know."

Hmm…

"So you were in other timelines, I take it?"

"Some of them." MRobin lazily tosses a Levin Sword in his right hand. "There're two of us, you know."

…Huh.

"Why are you here, then?"

MRobin just smirks. "You should have a pretty good idea right now."

I…uh, really don't.

I shrug.

MRobin slumps. "Jeez, seriously?" He shakes his head. "Come on… I'm here for Grima."

…

"You're doing what now?"

"Grima. Life. Pursuit of happiness. All that jazz." MRobin says, waving his hands in the air like he's talking to an idiot.

_Which he is._

"Why?" Cherche asks.

"Because I can." MRobin shrugs. "It's more fun that way, right?"

…

Robin has always been either 'Overly Serious' or 'Utterly Mindscrewed', so this particular variant of 'Who Cares?' Robin is weird.

_That seems to be a running trend with the bad guys we're up against._

"I can hardly define something like that as fun." Cherche says firmly.

MRobin retaliates by firing a thoron over her head. Cherche flinches despite herself.

"Well, you're not the one trying now, are ya?" MRobin laughs, and I worry about his mental integrity.

"I think this is the part where I monologue about my evil, evil plans." MRobin says offhandedly. "So, where do I start?"

Before any of us can get a word in, however…

"Bah, I hate monologuing. Long story short! Ash, you're going to be a pain in my ass in the future, therefore, I'm going to need you gone." MRobin points his sword at me. "No hard feelings."

_Fighting against enemies that are genre savvy sucks, huh?_

Minerva roars and shoots a stream of fire at Robin as soon as his last sentence left his mouth. MRobin doesn't seem to care in the slightest, merely stepping away from the line of fire.

"Next is…" I hear MRobin say as Cherche (with Minerva and me) rams into MRobin with her poleaxe.

MRobin blocks her swing with his Levin sword, getting knocked back in the process.

_"You still hit as hard as ever." MRobin says with a grin._

I know he said something, but Cherche just did a hit and run and now Minerva's running away again on foot…and their archers aren't really giving chase.

…

[3rd person camera]

…

"Is this alright?" One of the archers ask Male!Robin.

"Yeah. Gangrel's time is almost up anyways." MRobin smirks. "Let them do our dirty work; we're pulling out, men!"

"If I may ask, sir." One of the Pegasus Knights say with a faint blush on her face. "What are your plans?"

MRobin strokes her hair and causes her to shiver. "Time will tell, my good lady, time will tell."

…

[1st person camera]

…

"Who in the blazes was that?!" Cherche snarls at me after we determined that we were no longer being pursued.

"I…" I'm too disoriented to answer.

"And what was that…absurd…magical power?!" Cherche is venting. "I've never seen anything like it!"

Ok, ok. Let her vent. We need to calm down and collect our thoughts.

Deep breath, deep breath.

_What do we know?_

One: Male!Robin is potentially another guy from the future, from possibly a future different from the one our Robin came from.

Two: He knows us and is directly opposed to us.

_Why?_

Fuck if I know.

Three: He's touched in the head.

Four: He's genre savvy and obviously planning something, something that involves using us for his benefit.

_And your reasoning for that is…_

If the positions were reversed I would've shot him on the spot. Assuming if he's as proactive about eliminating future threats as I am that's what should have happened. We should have died there.

_Five: He could be pretending._

That's…

_He never said who he is._

He knew who we were.

_Gangrel knows who you are…it's not exactly a state secret. The only thing we know is that he's "Here for Grima."_

And that's not a cause for worry how?

_Who's providing the context for that statement?_

...Fair point. He looked totally like Robin though.

_We're in reality now. Conservation of detail doesn't necessarily apply._

Daydreams and Nightmares had a duplicate cloak situation, so it's entirely likely to have a duplicate face and wardrobe situation?

_Not to mention any other fanfics you've never managed to read. C'mon, tailors exist and the Grimleal is a religion. Dye does in fact exist._

In other words, the only piece of solid, concrete information I have is that someone is playing dress up to look like Male!Robin, and that someone has extreme amounts of magical power…

And he knew what Cherche was going to do.

Ugh.

I shake my head.

"What?" Cherche asks sulkily.

"Nothing. Let's get back to Chrom."

Oh shit Chrom

Cherche's eyes widen. "Yeah."

…

Minerva takes off into the air and we fly towards the general direction where the rest of the Shepherds are supposed to be.

…

Hmm…I still don't know why MRobin even bothered with us to begin with.

_Maybe it's because we tried to kill his friends._

Ok, fair point. We did try to do that.

…

…

After a fair time of flying we see spots of light in the distance…those look like Robin's signal flares.

Judging by how many of them I'm seeing, they're not in a good position.

_Enemy units in the air, too._

"Take us lower!" I yell to Cherche.

I don't think she heard me, but Minerva inverted and dove like a goddamn missile, righting herself a few feet above the ground and zooming toward the rest of the Shepherds.

…

[3rd person camera]

…

"Virion, three on your left!" Robin yells from her position on the wagon, which was now on its side and missing its cover.

Virion obligingly swings to aim at his left side, picking off three enemy archers before they had the chance to fire.

"Things aren't look so well, are they, my fair lady?" Virion says with a laugh, his eyes still trained on the crowd of Plegian soldiers before them.

"Not now." Robin snaps, firing a red flare to the right side of the battlefield.

Fredrick and Sully charge from behind the wagon into the right side of the field, scattering and mowing down a cluster of Myrimdons with their lances.

"Thank our lucky stars these guys aren't heavy infantry." Robin mutters to herself. "Virion, heads up." She says as she simultaneously fires a light blue flare over another section of the battlefield.

Virion dutifully looks up and aims his bow, just as Cordelia and Sumia dive down on a pair of unsuspecting Plegian mages.

The Plegian Wyvern Knights chasing down the two Shepherd girls suddenly found themselves under fire, and pulled out of their dive to avoid being shot to death.

"Marvelous, you truly are a master of…" Virion starts to say, and then trails off since Robin is paying him zero attention.

Robin fires a green flare toward the left of the battlefield, toward a series of Plegian soldiers being kept at bay by Kellam and Gregor.

Olivia and Lon'qu, formerly defending the right side of the impromptu wagon-wall, immediately disengages from the Mercenaries they were fighting against and struck at the flanks of the soldiers fighting against Kellam and Gregor, dispatching them with ease.

The Mercenaries, seeing their path to the wagon and the strategist on top of it unhindered, charged forward.

Their charge was then cut short when Fredrick and Sully charge into them from their rear (having circled around through very amorphous Plegian lines) and ran them down.

"Seriously." Robin sighs and scans the rest of the Plegian forces arrayed before them. "This isn't getting us anywhere." She then glanced down toward the people sheltered behind the wagon. "How's it going?"

"Donnel will make it just fine." Maribelle huffs as she pops out the spent healing orb on her staff and replaces it with a new one, the bloody javelin that used to be embedded in the boy's side on the dusty ground beside her. "I shudder at the hygiene of this workplace."

Robin hops down from her perch (dragging Virion with her), dodging a few balls of fire that sailed over their head. "Yeah, this place sucks."

"That's an understatement." Lissa grumbles, her attention focused on healing Ricken's stab wound in his chest.

"It can't be helped; nobody predicted Plegia's arrayed and well-prepared defenses." Miriel says, firing a bolt of lightning between Gregor and Kellam and striking a Plegian Soldier square on the head.

Robin nods. "Yeah, it's really weird…what's even weirder is the little girl." She frowns at Nowi.

Nowi had somehow found a knife and spent the entirety of the battle so far running gleefully through the enemy ranks and stabbing at the legs of the Plegian soldiers.

"I don't know who she is or what she is, but Ash did a good job finding her." Robin continues. "Although she's a little too bloodthirsty for her own good." She pauses to unleash a barrage of fire that arced through the sky and struck at the soldiers disoriented by Nowi.

"I must respectfully disagree, Dear Robin." Virion laughs, downing another enemy Pegasus knight. "She has yet to take a life, merely their toes."

Nowi, meanwhile, was complaining up a storm.

"Aah…this sucks! Running sucks! Stabbing sucks! I want my stone back!" She deftly rolls over a Plegian spear and jumps onto a Plegian Cavalier's horse. "You wouldn't happen to know where it is, do ya?"

The Plegian Cavalier blinked in confusion before his training took over and his hand strayed to his sword.

"Darn." Nowi said simply and yanked on the horse's harness, causing the beast to stumble.

The Cavalier fell onto the ground with a surprised yell.

"Jeez, you need better saddles." Nowi laughs and hops off the horse. "And I really should've learned about horseback riding."

"Seriously, how is she doing that?" Robin asks the sky as the Plegian troops rapidly lose steam against the flexibly tight defense of the Shepherds.

"War is an art." Virion said simply.

A Plegian Fighter managed to circle around the side of the wagon, and found his foot swept from underneath him by a pink blur.

"Um…I don't want to kill, so please just surrender quietly, ok?" Olivia said sweetly, her sword inches from his neck.

The Plegian Fighter stared at her chest and sparkles for a few seconds before nodding quietly.

Olivia knocked him out with the flat of her blade for good measure. "Seriously." She mumbles, feeling a little self conscious about the dancer outfit (plus under armor) she was wearing.

"And that's why you're our last line of defense." Robin laughs. "Virion, we're going back up."

"At once, milady." Virion flips onto the wagon without a second thought and fires into the thinning Plegian crowd with his impressive speed.

Robin jumps up onto the wagon, and surveys the situation for a brief moment. "Ok, I think we can finish this."

She then fires three red flares over her head.

The Plegian ranks shook and broke as a very loud and aggressive Chrom (backed by Vaike) charged out from behind the wagon. With each swing, their weapons blew away Plegian equipment, Plegian bodies, and the Plegian morale.

And then Robin, Miriel, Nino, and Ricken (being supported up by Lissa) unleashes a thunderstorm on their heads.

…

[1st person camera]

…

Yeah, I think I would run like hell after that, too.

We're now almost right on top of the Shepherds…it's amazing nobody on our side saw us yet, except maybe Donnel, but he didn't look too good.

_Must've been because they were too busy trying to stay alive._

Yeah, that's probably it.

Minerva roars as she comes to a stop right over the overturned wagon, and I take this moment to aim at what I think is the Plegian general and empty my railgun into him.

_All three shots._

Hey, I contributed something to this battle, dammit!

_All three shots crashed into the ground near the Plegian Captain (he's probably not a general, let's be honest) and it scares him enough to call for a retreat._

See? I'm credit to team.

Cherche takes us down and we land next to the overturned and battered wagon.

Judging by the bodies littered around I'd say the attacking group was probably between fifty to a hundred soldiers…I think there's about 20 dead and three captured. Jury's out on how many wounded.

"Ash! What happened over there?" Robin demands before I even hop off of Minerva.

Which reminds me, I should hop off of Minerva…

And find out that my legs aren't supporting my weight anymore. Wonderful.

"Well, they knew we were coming." I say as I roll to face the sky.

"Jeez, are you ok?" Lissa asks worriedly as she rushes over to help my legs.

_She touches our legs and we wince in pain._

That hurt a lot more than I thought it would.

"Explain." Robin demands coldly.

"Long story short…we started the operation, and then got jumped on by a large patrol unit."

Cherche sighs. "And there was this man who looked remarkably like you, Robin."

Robin glances at her. "Really? What did he do?"

"He toyed around with us and then let us go….fuck, ow." Lissa pouring magic into my legs is actually quite painful.

"Toyed around with you?" Robin narrows her eyes.

"He surrounded us with archers, but it seemed as if they weren't ordered to fire." Cherche said.

Wait, really?

"How could you tell?" Robin and I ask in unison.

"I looked." Cherche says simply. "While you were busy keeping his attention."

"Dammit, so they knew we were coming the whole time?" Robin slams her fist into the wagon. "Unbelievable."

"I suppose we should be glad that there were no losses suffered on our side." Fredrick said diplomatically.

"That doesn't mean much." Robin sighs and jumps onto the wagon again, and then proceeds to…stare at the sky, ok.

"So what happened with you guys?" I ask…whoever is around.

_Lissa has finished with her healing and our legs feel as good as new._

Lon'qu gives me a hand and pulls me upright. "We struck the caravan." He says with a jerk of his head towards his left. "The caravan was a decoy; they had troops hiding in them and very little supplies."

"Meaning we're pretty close to a major base of operations, ok." I nod to myself.

Lon'qu blinks. "Right…anyways, we ran and they chased us out here."

…

That's quite succinct of you, Lon'qu.

"Hey! Ash! Welcome back!" Nowi says from on top of the wagon.

When did she jump up there?

"Why'd you collapse?" She asks cheerfully.

"I didn't do my math right." I laugh.

"Really?" Nino p-oh god they're together.

_Oh god Lissa Nino and Nowi are in the same spot._

Stay cool and maybe they won't notice

"Yeah, this thing" I pat my gun "kicks a lot harder with extenders…which will probably never be made again."

"That bad, huh?" Nowi jumps down from her perch and pat my knees.

"It…couldn't have gone much worse, I think." I'm a little confused as to why she's playing with my knees. Confused and concerned.

"Was that why you guys screwed up?" Nowi asks innocently despite hitting the nail on the head.

I nod. "Yeah, let's go with that."

"Alright, everyone!" Chrom yells out, jumping onto the overturned wagon and using it as a podium. "We will now give chase to the enemy, and follow them to Gangrel and end this bloody war!"

…

"Wait, wait. Seriously?" I frown.

"Uh-huh." Nowi nods, tossing a—ok who the hell gave Nowi a knife—knife nonchalantly in her right hand. "This is a pretty big gamble."

_We kind of figured that._

"But it's not like we can just wait around for more people to show up." Nowi says happily. "So let's do it! Let's take the fight to them!"

Is…is Nowi pro-war or anti-war? I can't tell.

"The wagon's no longer useable, so we're going to have to make some changes." Robin says (next to Chrom on their wagon-podium). "Chrom, you're with Fredrick."

Chrom nods. "Ok."

"Sully, you're taking Virion."

Sully scowls. "What? Are you kiddin' me?!"

Virion opens his mouth. "Surely it isn't such a—"

Sully cuts him off. "Yes it is, you peacock. Ugh." Virion closes his mouth.

_I'm already starting to see a problem here._

"Having to abandon most of our wagons really hurt us." Robin mutters. "Lissa, you're with Stahl."

"Ok!"

Maribelle glares at Stahl. "Don't you dare touch a hair on her head."

Stahl just grins sheepishly.

"Maribelle, you're taking Nowi."

Nowi bounces with a very happy "Yay!" and Maribelle…looks like she's about to choke someone. Anyone.

"Must be awful, having a mount." Robin says with the craftiest tiny grin on her face.

"I'll get you for this, Robin." Maribelle mutters (more to herself) and then proceeds to stop Nowi from…doing something to her horse. I'm not quite sure what's going on.

"Oy, we're not going to have enough seats." VAIKE says.

"I'm well aware." Robin sighs. "Vaike, you're with Kyle; Cherche, you can take Nino and Ricken."

Have the kids ride double. He he he.

"Ash, can you…uh." Robin starts to say then trails off.

How many riders do we have left?

_Amelia and Cordelia; Sumia left along with the enemy to follow them._

I shrug. "I think I can keep up on foot." I tap my shoes together for emphasis.

"If you say so." Robin frowns. "Amelia is with me, and Cordelia is with Gregor; everyone else, Lon'qu will act as the sub-captain, follow us as best as you are able."

_This is a horrible strategy._

If we're too slow we'll get bogged down and die.

If we're too fast we get strung out and can't do anything, and then get cut to pieces and die.

I miss having a preparation screen.

"All units! Move out!" Chrom roars, and Fredrick takes off at a gallop, with everyone else following behind them, headed toward the direction of the Plegian retreat.

Y'know, it's really nice that this place has nothing but dust and sand or it would've been really unbearable.

Wait shit I'm supposed to keep up with them

_Wind shoes! Full power!_

At full power I'm moon bouncing. This is not a good method of travel.

_We're moving forward at a rapid pace while jumping up a good three feet or so (about a meter) per step. This means that every step causes a massive blast of sand and dust behind us, and also makes little pebbles and other debris our mortal enemy._

I feel my soles slipping with each step. This was a horrible idea.

That being said, I am keeping up, so that's nice.

…

[3rd party camera]

…

"Wow, that's impressive." Olivia remarked, looking at the dust cloud being left by Ash's footsteps. "I wish I knew how to use magic like that."

"It feels more like a party trick than magic, though." Lon'qu said indifferently. "Now come, we need to make haste as well."

…

…

"Sir!" A Plegian soldier says as he rushes into a nondescript throne room and hurriedly bows.

"Speak." Gangrel says curtly, playing with his Levin sword idly while watching the battle line in front of him.

"The Shepherds are making their way here!"

"Ah…" Aversa sighs. "Such a well prepared ambush, and it's entirely wasted…"

"I'm…I'm sorry, milady." The Plegian soldier stammers. "But they struck with much greater force than any of us had anticipated."

"And what of their…wizard?" Gangrel demands icily.

"He…he was nowhere to be seen, your highness." The Plegian man gulps, feeling the sweat rolling down his neck.

"Hmm…so that man was right after all." Gangrel sighed. "Perhaps he was right about you, too." He says idly to Aversa.

Aversa chuckles. "If that man is right about everything, then it would be best for us to surrender before this fight even begins."

Gangrel grins, showing his canines. "If I cared that much about destiny I would've remained a street rat." He then levels the Levin sword at the messenger. "Get out."

The messenger scrambles away from the throne room at full speed.

"Now then…let's give our guests a warm welcome, shall we?" Gangrel says, and strides out of the hall.

…

[1st person camera]

…

My feet hurt.

This magic really wasn't meant to be used for extended periods of time, especially not at this output.

It feels like someone's hitting the bottom of my feet with feathers and the feathers are made of nails.

I don't know how that even works.

_So what do we see?_

Uh…sand. Sand. More sand. Slightly off color sand to our right, shimmery sand to our left. Sand that's being kicked up behind us.

These cavalry have no problems on sand, apparently…though to be fair it's not exactly sand dunes we're working with, either.

Ugh.

I need to learn how to fly.

Air support may not win wars, but goddammit if I drop enough bombs there won't be a war left to fight.

That should really be my philosophy from now on.

_'Murica._

…

…

Hey look, I've caught up.

_And it's only taken us…what, an hour?_

Uh…my legs feel like lead. This is going to end badly.

"Why are we stopping?" I ask as I slow down and stop next to the rearmost element (Stahl, as it turns out).

Lissa gives a shriek and nearly falls off of the horse.

"I didn't think you'd actually catch up!" Lissa says after she regains her seating (thanks to Stahl).

"Thanks for the vote of confidence." I say glumly because my legs still feel dead.

I feel like I should go and play the part of a zombie in a movie.

"Look at these tracks." Robin says after Amelia lands with her. "This is probably where they ran off to."

_The tracks she points to include a metric ton of horse hooves and heavy, heavy footprints. Everything looks very chaotic, but all the prints at least point in the same direction._

_The same direction being a crude-looking stone fortress not far in the distance. To the left of the fortress is sand, rock, and very broken terrain. Ditto to the right, but at least there seems to be a path running through the badlands on the right._

"Could be a trap." I say.

Robin nods. "Yeah. Alright; mages, we're up. Ash, you too." She holds a tome out to me.

I obligingly take the tome. "What are we doing?"

"We're going to bombard it from here."

Uh… "And ruin our element of surprise?"

"Yep." Robin says confidently. "Less talking, more casting."

_We shrug._

Now, let's see here…this is…a normal fire tome…that has additional spell circles drawn into it.

Judging by the looks of things, the damage output has been decreased in favor of better spell cohesion, so it reaches further and explodes louder.

In other words, we are literally going to attack the fortress with fireworks and loud noises.

"Alright, ready?" Robin says, and we nod. "Ok, fire!"

…

_A flurry of fire spells fly out from Robin, Us, Nino, and Ricken and impact the fortress, showering it in red sparks._

…

Dear lord that's loud.

It's like someone clapping right beside your ear in a totally quiet room.

"Ok, round two!" Robin says after a few seconds, and we oblige.

…

…

[Eight rounds later]

…

…

"Damn." Robin snarls.

I look at her. "What now?"

_Compared to the rest of the mages we are actually a bit out of breath; casting from spell paper doesn't make us better mages in the long run._

"I hoped they would at least show some kind of response." Robin mutters. "Not good. We're moving to Phase two; all units, remount!"

Well, we know they know about us, and that's bad because…

"This is bad because that means whoever was in that fortress knew about us." Robin clarifies. "So much for a swift strike. Damn."

Robin's eyes then glow with an eerie light. "Mages! Bombardment fire to your left on three!"

Most of us are too disoriented to argue, and we prep spells like she wants us to.

"Three!"

_Robin skipped one and two._

May she never hold a hand grenade; we fire a blanket of these watered-down fire spells into our left side, and Plegian soldiers jump out of hiding.

"Thought so." Robin says. "Alright, we're falling back to our other units; no point pressing where there isn't an advantage. All units, battle formations!"

As the enemy soldiers come out of the rockworks the cavaliers form up next to Fredrick.

I feel a tap on my shoulder. "Get on." Amelia says curtly, and I oblige. "Hey! Watch it." She says after I lean back into her chest.

_During the bombardment Gregor was reassigned to Sumia (since she's here now)._

"Sorry." I stop leaning against her chest…Cherche flies a little too fast.

_Amelia's are smaller._

Might just be because of the armor though; I ready my rifle. "Alright, let's do this."

Amelia takes off and joins Cordelia and Sumia, who were already in the air, and we charge back the way we came from.

"Ash!" I hear her yell and feel a tap on my right shoulder, so I look…and see a wing of Plegian Pegasus Knights flying in.

"I blame Robin for this." I mutter, and take aim at the enemy Pegasus Knights.

…This is incredibly hard when the Pegasus is actually flying instead of gliding. The constant up and down fluctuation is making this actually impossible, wow.

I wish I played more FPS games now.

Fuck it. Fire! Fire! Fire!

_We only have three shots before we need to reload. And Amelia isn't really giving us elbow room._

This is why planes have machine guns instead of sniper rifles. Reload, reload…also, fairly certain I'm going to get smacked in the face once we get to the ground, given how many soft things my elbow is running into.

How is the ground anyways?

Let's see.

Our riders are going as fast as they can against a bunch of Plegian cavaliers…but the cavaliers are catching up due to them being more used to the terrain and not having multiple riders.

_Meanwhile in the sky Cordelia and Sumia are tossing Javelins at the enemy Pegasus knights with precision accuracy…it's less of an issue of sniping being hard in the air and just us being bad at our jobs._

Ok, we need to clear up the chas-ok never mind they are shooting at us from the ground. We are not going to clear out the chasers any time soon.

The horseback sword/bow class? Total bullshit and I hate all of them.

Just keep flying, yeah.

…

"Looks like they're giving up?" Amelia…asks? After noticing that the enemy fliers weren't behind us.

She's been flying hard for a good ten, fifteen minutes, they better have given up.

_Doesn't sound like she believes it either._

…

[Five minutes later]

…

Robin signals an all stop, and we do.

Or, rather, Robin signals an all stop, and we the ones in the air see why: in front of us is a battle waiting to happen.

Somewhere along the line Gangrel took an army and circled around us.

I'm not optimistic enough to believe that our chasers gave up entirely, so we're looking at the mother of all bad positions right now.

On the plus side, the Shepherds on foot got caught within the encirclement too, so we don't have to worry about them.

_It's a real plus that all of us are going to die here, yeah._

…It's a silver lining?

Amelia lands next to Robin, who's watching the situation with a look on her face that says something along the lines of "Oh fuck" and "Holy shit".

"Welp." I say after taking a deep breath. "Got anything else we can do?"

_Real plus side: Amelia is too stunned to slap us._

"Yeah." Robin says shakily, though there's a weird grin on her face now. "We join up with the others; we're almost done here." Robin calls out confidently, and we ride forward.

…

"Nice of you to join us." Lon'qu says evenly, not taking his eyes off of the crowd of heavy infantry before him.

_The fact that Gangrel marched KNIGHTs and GENERALs around and managed to perfectly trap us is a testament to just how much foresight he had on our movement._

Also, those guys need a fucking medal for wearing that much armor in this weather.

_To be fair it's not that hot. Just soul-suckingly dry._

If this isn't hot then water no longer deserves to be a liquid. I don't know what that means.

"Alright, on my order, we will form a wedge formation and cut straight into the enemy formation." Robin says.

"Are you crazy?!" Maribelle voices all of our thoughts.

Robin turns and gives her a very serene smile. "No, not at all."

...I'm scared.

"Fliers, keep low; Ash, fire everything you have at Gangrel." Robin continues. "You can see where he is by that stupid crown he wears."

I can imagine him disguising his position by giving someone else the crown, but ok. "Got it."

"Keep your wits about you, everyone. We can do this." Chrom says reassuringly.

"Big brother, if we die from this I'm blaming you for everything." Lissa says sulkily.

"Even that ice cream you stole from Emm when you were little?" Chrom chuckles.

Lissa freezes. "Especially that!"

"I could go for some ice cream right now, though." Stahl groans. "What I wouldn't give for a nice cold bath."

"Shouldn't we be more worried 'bout dyin'?" Donnel (and I think this is the first time I've heard him speak) asks.

"Nah…I won't let anyone of you die." Robin…is remarkably confident about that. "Upon my honor as a tactician; besides…"

She grins at us.

"Hope will never die."

Suddenly, the left side (my left, their right) of the Plegian line shudder and break.

"Just in time." Robin grins. "Shepherds! GO!"

…

[3rd Person Camera]

…

"That Marth guy is good." Basilio remarks as his massive fucking axe™ cuts its way through the surprised Plegian Knights. "He even knew what formation they had."

"Yeah…suspicious." Tharja mutters, blasting Flux after Flux toward Gangrel's general direction. "I'd like to know more about him."

"We can discuss his personality later." Flavia grumbles. "Charge! We'll end this war once and for all!"

The men under their command (a mix of mercenary Mercenaries, Plegian Shamans, and Feroxi Fighters) roars in reply, and drive into the Plegian line with renewed vigor.

…

[1st Person Camera]

…

Holy fucking shit we might actually do this

Wait shit I have a job

Uh

Uh

Find douchebag with crown. Where is…that guy is really tall and bald, so no…right side…right side…there!

FUCK YOU NOBLE I HAVE GUN!

_We fire nonstop at the crown, giving absolutely zero thought to how much damage we end up doing, although judging by the way the enemy knight line is merely shuddering and not breaking every time we pull the trigger the effect of the rifle isn't all too great._

I don't even know if I'm hitting the right target but I don't care because every cell in my body has been replaced with adrenaline aaaaaaa

_That doesn't even make sense._

_Ok, backing up for a minute._

[Backing up]

_Thanks._

_Anyways, once the Plegian line was hit from the back by the mysterious helpers (though you readers know who it is) Robin organized an immediate charge. The shepherd wedge formation (being led by Fredrick, flanked by Sully and Stahl, because we don't have nearly as many cavaliers as the DS remakes) dashed toward the left side of the line, where it was the weakest. We, being the idiot with the gun that we were, dropped out of the charge to snipe at the dude wearing the crown who may or may not be Gangrel._

_Of course, the Plegians aren't stupid either; what used to be a concave formation with us in the center is now broken on the left, so the right side of the concave is folding in on us slowly but sturdily, and the dust coming from what used to be our back (now our right) heralds the incoming of the Plegian light cavalry._

_In other words…Robin's leading us closer to the reinforcements so we at least have some kind of cover against the Plegians._

[Finished Backing Up]

…

All that being said, the Plegian line is actually not too solid to begin with; it's hardly the swarming mass of troops I expected it to be.

_Miriel fires a beam of fire-wreathed lightning into the Plegian Knights, scattering them and blasting the armor clean from some of them._

Thought judging by that display I can see why.

_Standard medieval tactics work poorly against someone who can literally kill people with her mind._

_…_

Is…is that?

Douchebag in tacky yellow clothing sighted! It's Gangrel! And he actually is wearing his crown!

_I don't think anyone would be dumb enough to give their proof of power to someone else in a country where succession rights are based on merit and opportunity._

_Apparently **we** thought otherwise._

"Fuck, Robin was actually right." I say, and change direction toward Gangrel. He seems to be pretty calm, all things considered…calm and missing bodyguards.

This is very obviously a trap.

_So we're going to spring it first and save Robin the trouble._

Ayep.

_I don't think this is considered good tactics by a majority of the population._

I played Fire Emblem. You send in the thief to nearly die and then mop up the rest with everybody else. It works just fine.

…I forget. Did Awakening not have a fog of war map? I don't remember playing a fog of war map in the game.

_While our mind is wandering, our body is skating on the wind shoes in a mild curve around the Plegian line (from the backside of the concave since Robin and Chrom has now rendezvoused with Basilio and Flavia) and firing into the line at where we think Gangrel is._

It's mildly calming; nobody is throwing double-ended javelins at us, which is, interestingly enough, making me even more paranoid…

Ok…

The Plegian line has…not necessarily collapsed, but they've certainly broken formation…which is good for us, since we can now actually reach Gangrel without worrying about being cut to pieces.

It's bad for us because we actually need to fight to reach Gangrel now; the front lines of the formation was comprised of Knights. The rest? Myrimdons.

Unhook the chain greatsword, rehook the railgun.

_We won't have the time to swap chains if we break one; we're stuck with using the sword covering._

So let's find the idiots with thin armor and plow through them instead.

…

[3rd Person Camera]

…

"Ash is doing what?" Robin asked in disbelief upon Amelia's information.

"Just like Marth said he would. That moron." Basilio growled. "What are we going to do?"

"We're going to support." Chrom said tersely. "Shepherds, on me! We'll cut our way through!"

"Thought you might say that." Flavia muttered. "Alright lads! Let's show them what Ragno Ferox can do!"

…

Gangrel looked at the man with the oversized sword dive into his soldiers with a look of satisfaction.

"Sir, if that man is right, you should retreat from here." One of his bodyguards said.

"Pah. I didn't become a king just to chain myself to superstition." Gangrel snapped. "Let him through."

"Ah…" the bodyguard wilted under Gangrel's glare. "Yes sir."

…

[1st Person Camera]

…

Uh…I was expecting more resistance. What gives?

The Plegian soldiers have backed off and are making a…oh…shit.

_Gangrel stands on the opposite side of the soldier-ring-clearing._

"Outrealmer Ash." Gangrel said solemnly, walking up to me.

_It's amazing how unearthly quiet it is._

"I take it you have met with…Him." Gangrel spat out that pronoun with a lot of vehemence.

I stare at Gangrel. "'Him' being the jackass with the white hair?"

Gangrel chuckles. "Strange language is right." He says to himself. "According to him, I am going to die by your hand." Gangrel takes out his Levin sword and spins it in his hand. "I'm not one to believe in destiny."

_I wonder how many actions did we take that were EXACTLY like the self that became the jaded anti-hero in the future_.

Welp. "Let's see how it works out for you, then." Activate Chain Greatsword. Here goes nothing.

…

[3rd Person Camera]

…

Ash's wind shoes kicks up to full power and he lunges toward Gangrel at full speed.

"Let's take that away from you." Gangrel growls as he jumps away from Ash's charge.

As Ash plants his feet to slow down (inadvertently showering some of the Plegian soldiers with sand and dust) Gangrel fires a bolt of lightning from his Levin Sword and strikes the ground next to Ash, showering his eyes with sand and dirt.

Gangrel then sweeps Ash's legs from underneath him and fires another bolt from the Levin Sword at Ash's calves.

Ash rolls away from Gangrel and stand shakily.

Gangrel glares at Ash. "I missed." He says slightly.

"Yeah, I noticed. Fuck that hurt." Ash growls, shaking slightly.

"You are…not the experienced warrior he said you were." Gangrel shakes his head. "Disappointing."

"I'm a professional nerd." Ash says simply, charging again.

Gangrel jumps to the side again.

Ash diverts the wind on his shoes to put himself into a quick spin to face Gangrel, and quickly fires the two nails in his arm launcher thing (I don't think I ever gave it a formal name).

Gangrel, seeing Ash's left arm raise toward him, immediately assumed "hidden weapon" and dove to his right while simultaneously firing a round of thunder from his Levin sword.

Ash's attack didn't connect, Gangrel's did.

Ash is now on one knee and shaking from the damage.

"He definitely overstated your worth." Gangrel smirks.

Ash grits his teeth and stands back up, and blinks in surprise as Gangrel charges forward instead.

Ash's greatsword is far too bulky and slow (even with the rocket motors) to actually catch Gangrel and his agility, and thus Ash is forced to rely on his wind shoes to spin and create the momentum necessary to swing said sword in a very unsafe way around him like a slow tornado.

Gangrel, undaunted, jumps over Ash's spinning and kick him in the head, knocking the man with the wind shoes off balance.

_Ok, running out of ideas here. _Ash thought, shaking the blood from his eyes and the dizzy from his head.

"Just like he said." Gangrel sighed. "You run in here headfirst, weapons drawn, and cut your way through the soldiers, and then fight me…and win. Obviously," Gangrel pulls a dagger from his cloak. "Something is going horribly wrong here."

_No shit, Sherlock. _Ash stands again, and contemplates running away like a little pussy, because it is the strategically smart thing to do when there isn't a healer with a Physic staff around.

"Let's finish this." Gangrel charges forward one last time, and Ash activates the chain on the sword.

Gangrel sidesteps Ash's swing and slashes at him in response.

Ash activates the jets on the sword along with his wind shoes and swings around surprisingly quickly for another slash, forcing Gangrel to take the blow with his dagger.

"Not bad." Gangrel says as he recovers his footing, a good eight feet away from Ash due to the force of the Greatsword.

Ash takes a deep breath, and lowers his sword point toward Gangrel.

"You know I'm not a good guy, right?" Gangrel suddenly says, catching Ash off guard. "Do it."

Ash immediately remembers that he is surrounded by enemy soldiers and uses his wind shoes to barely get hit by an arrow fired from a Sniper, getting hit on the left arm instead of square in the back.

Ash looks up just in time to see Gangrel rushing up to him. The momentum granted to him via his wind shoes causes Ash to run himself straight into Gangrel's dagger.

"I know you're trying to break my sword, boy." Gangrel smirks, twisting the dagger in Ash's wound.

Ash, in response, taps his pocket spell book with his elbow and punches Gangrel in the torso with a fire-wreathed fist.

Gangrel hops back and glance at his smoking clothing with surprise.

Ash, meanwhile, is maintaining his ability to stand with great difficulty while the word "fuck" echoes in his head over and over.

The two of them then look around in surprise as a trio of Pegasus Knights (plus two Wyvern riders) swoop into the impromptu arena.

Minvera and Kyle's wyvern breathe fire onto the crowd of stunned soldiers, immediately sending said surrounding soldiers into chaos, while Chrom, Robin, and Lon'qu dismount from the Pegasus Knights.

"You moron, Ash!" Robin yells at him.

…

[1st Person Camera]

…

In my defense!

Ah fuck this hurts too much to make coherent thought.

…

[Alright, fine]

[3rd Person Camera]

…

Ash simply shakes his head and glares at Gangrel as the three Pegasus (and two Wyvern) knights take into the air again, joining the battle raging in the sky that Ash didn't notice because he was too busy getting the shit kicked out of him.

_There're a lot more Pegasus Knights up there than I thought. _Ash thought.

"How did you get here so fast, prince?" Gangrel asked, as if making polite conversation (over the sound of soldiers screaming about being on fire).

Chrom wasn't nearly as unperturbed. "I've come to end this, Mad King."

Gangrel shrugs, and snaps his fingers. "You're free to try, you spoiled brat." A trio of Heroes, Gangrel's royal guard, arrive as if by magic.

Behind the Shepherds, a pair of Plegian Generals also make their entrance, towering over their lesser (and on fire) comrades.

"Here, drink this." Robin tosses a Vulnerary at Ash, who pops it open and empties the bottle in one swig. "There was only a little left; sorry."

"You're a lifesaver, Robin." Ash says gratefully, feeling the Vulnerary dull the pain of the dagger still lodged in his waist as he tosses the now empty bottle aside.

"You don't make it easy." Robin sighs, and opens hostilities by firing a Thoron toward Gangrel's bodyguards.

Said bodyguards immediately break ranks and charges toward the Shepherds.

"We'll take them. Robin!" Chrom calls out.

"On it!" Robin turns and fires another Thoron at the Generals behind her. "Ash, can you fight?"

Ash's response is to take a deep breath and spool the chain on his greatsword once more. Due to his focus being disturbed by the pain the sword roars with power.

Robin nods. "Excellent. We'll ignore the Generals and focus on taking down Gangrel."

Ash does a double take, as he was just about to charge into the Generals. "Wait what?"

"Take him down, and get out of here." Robin says simply before rushing towards Gangrel, who is currently fighting with Chrom.

"But…Ok ow." Ash waves his Chain Greatsword slightly, wincing due to the knife wound. "I had a plan and everything!"

…

"Princeling, how does it feel to fight destiny?" Gangrel asks with a snarl, clashing with Chrom and the Falchion over and over.

"Destiny? Fate can be changed, mad king." Chrom retorts, swinging low and forcing Gangrel to jump up. He did not see the brief smile that formed on Gangrel's face.

Gangrel uses his jump momentum to swing downwards at Chrom, but Lon'qu blocks the swing with his sword, forcing Gangrel off balance. Unfortunately Lon'qu couldn't capitalize on his advantage due to Gangrel's bodyguards occupying his attention.

With a roar and a heavy swing, Chrom strikes one of the Hero bodyguards and sends him flying.

"How breathtaking." Gangrel sneers, rushing at Chrom again and pulling out another knife from his belt.

Chrom's response is to meet Gangrel's Levin Sword with the Falchion and parrying the dagger with the Fire Emblem.

Gangrel smirks, and the Levin Sword discharges a bolt of thunder at Chrom at point blank range.

Chrom, having pretty bad magic resistance (even after Robin tried to remedy it with a talisman) felt the spell course through his body and quickly darted back.

Gangrel then had to block with his Levin Sword as a Thoron bolt lanced inches away from his face.

Robin rushes next to Chrom as he gets back on his feet. "I'm here; let's do this."

Lon'qu disengages from the Hero bodyguards by kicking up dust into their eyes (it was not overly effective). "We need to finish this now."

"Agreed." Chrom nods, and then scowls as the Hero bodyguards rushed back to their king to form a wall with their shields.

"Shoot them!" Gangrel yells, and Robin surrounds the three Shepherds with a cyclone of wind magic to protect them against the would-be hail of arrows.

…

"GIGA!" Ash yells, ignoring the wound in his waist and rocketing forward at maximum running speed, his wind shoes completely useless and forgotten somewhere in the sand.

The loud yell gave the Plegian archers enough pause for Ash to rush past the Shepherds and go straight at the Hero shield wall.

"SHIELD!" The Chain Greatsword roars with power, the chain itself spinning so fast it was overheating.

"BREAAAAAKE!" With one swing, Ash cuts through the shields (which were primarily made of wood anyways) and shows the Heroes holding said shields splinters of wood and metal. Due to having sustained injury, Ash's sense of distance was off and the heroes themselves were unharmed.

The Heroes, seeing that they themselves were unharmed, raised their swords and charged at Ash, before stopping short as they catch Robin running toward them at full speed.

Robin then suddenly breaks off to one side of the Heroes before they can formulate a counter attack. Suddenly, they become very aware that Robin had lined all of them up in a straight line with that little maneuver.

With a roar, Robin unleashes a bolt of Thoron through the Heroes and the blast electrocutes and scatters everyone in a twenty meter line.

As the Thoron tome's pages incinerated themselves due to Robin using up all of their power in one go, Chrom and Lon'qu charges forward at Gangrel, who looked at them with an oddly calm expression.

Chrom, caught up in the moment, didn't notice Lon'qu stop short, and finished his charge with a swing of the Falchion.

The swing caught Gangrel and cut deep into the man's chest; with one last roar, Chrom pushed the Falchion through and Gangrel laid on the ground in two pieces, with all his viscera oozing out.

Chrom stood. The noise around him diminished somewhat (sans the people screaming because they were on fire, but most of them are now either dead or were successful in stopping, dropping, and rolling) as all the Plegian soldiers witnessed the death of their king.

With one little problem.

_Shit, he actually made a decoy in half a minute. _Ash thought as he limped up to the corpse.

"I know." Chrom said quietly.

…

[1st Person Camera]

…

The worst part is? The Decoy looks reasonably enough like Gangrel from a distance.

Fuck it, we're rolling with it.

Take a DEEEP OH god ow breath.

Power through, c'mon. We can do this.

"Your king has fallen!" I roar. "Drop your weapons!"

_We are now in extreme pain._

Most of the soldiers listen, but very few actually comply.

Robin punctuates her point by firing a pink flair into the air, getting the attention of the Plegian soldiers…just long enough for them to see Minerva and Kyle's ride swoop in and bathe the landscape in fire again.

_Not really a "bath". More like "spray paint." The wyvern's fire breath has a pretty small area of effect._

And to seal the deal…oh, oh hell yes.

Lucina shows up (mounted) with a squad of cavaliers.

The Plegian soldiers, demoralized and interested in living long enough to go home, lay down their weapons one by one.

…

…

…

"So, we finally did it, eh?" Basilio sighs.

It's almost dark, and we've made camp…far away from that clusterfuck of a battlefield.

Chrom, Robin, and Flavia are meeting with the Plegian army's second in command to discuss the terms of surrender, so the rest of us have nothing to do.

As an example: Basilio is drinking out of a jug, sitting around the fire with me, Donnel (who seems to actually be ok this time), Ricken (his hat is gone) and Anna (who is counting money).

_We never met Aversa, even though our scenarios all planned for her to be present._

Yeah…then again, we never got to do a death from above with the help of Amelia, either.

I have a lot of questions…and honestly this is pretty hard to wrap my head around without having the plot to help me.

"Oy, kid. You ok there?" Basilio asks…someone. "Ash." Asks me.

"Yeah, I'll live." I pat my waist gingerly. Fortunately the healer of the day was Lissa.

"Can't say the same for my men though." Basilio said bitterly, but flashes a smile as one of his surviving men pat him on the shoulder as they walk by.

_Basilio and Flavia's units took most of the losses…if I didn't know any better I'd say the strategy was almost planned around having the two of them lose units while the Shepherds remained fine and dandy._

NPC units are expendable. Always have, always will be.

"How did you guys know where to attack?" I ask.

"Ask Robin…or better yet, ask that girl." Basilio gestures to Lucina. "Didn't know he was a she. Hmph." He drains the jug.

_Lucina who is being questioned by Lissa and looks extremely uncomfortable._

Lucina is trying really hard to keep her…left? Eye from being visible, since that eye has the brand.

Welp.

…

"Hey! C'mon! Let me adopt you!" Lissa shouts as I get close enough to hear them over the rest of the camp.

What the heck? "Lissa? What are you doing?" I ask.

Lucina sees me and twitches.

_I think she was about to salute before she caught herself._

"Look at her pretty blue hair!" Lissa exclaims as she gets very touchy-feely with Lucina's pretty, long hair. "She's like Chrom if he was a girl."

Uh.

"So I'm going to adopt her as a sister!" Lissa declares proudly.

Hrm. "Wouldn't she be the big sister in that case?"

Lissa stops. "No, because I'm taller! See?" She hugs Lucina.

I…no, Lissa isn't taller.

"No, I don't see. Now stop harassing the poor girl before she loses her mind."

"Fiiine." Lissa pouts, crossing her arms.

As she walks by me, though…

_Lissa's left hands shifts closer to her right shoulder before pointing to her left eye._

So…she saw?

_I guess she knew it was something important if she didn't make a huge fuss out of it._

It's the Brand. It's kind of a big deal.

"Lucina." I say as a greeting.

Lucina nods. "S-Ash, was it?"

"Yeah…do you mind if I ask you something?"

She shakes her head. "Not at all…I will answer to the best of my knowledge."

I motion for her to sit. She does…with her back to the nearest campfire.

I copy her.

Conspiracy theory time. "So, what would have happened here?"

Lucina gulps. "In the original timeline, Robin cautiously approaches the castle with all of the Shepherds, and then they are surrounded and destroyed."

Whoa, wait, what?

"Well…that's what supposedly happened…but as you might be aware, other Children are alive and well…I am alive and well." Lucina amends.

I nod. If everyone died then the whole children thing gets complicated.

"Anyways, due to the Shepherds being routed, the Plegian-Ylissean war drags on…and with the presence of the Risen, things go poorly for Ylisse." She takes a deep breath. "At the end of the first year, Walhart stages an invasion, and as a result Feroxi withdraws their support for Ylisse."

And here I thought what we had was a clusterfuck.

"This is historian talk." Lucina admits. "I do not know of the reality behind those events, but to the best of my knowledge and the information available from the Ylissean castle library those were the events that transpired."

Ok, cool. "And so you told Robin?"

She pauses. "I…told her some information; namely, the fact that she would lose here if she acted cautiously."

Which explains why Robin's plan this time made no fucking sense. "Anything else?"

She shakes her head. "The rest of the information was due to a defector by the name of Tharja…" Lucina gives me a look that says very plainly:

_We know who she is, no point saying it out loud._

I nod. "We'll have to thank her, I suppose." So Tharja met up with Lucina?

Lucina jumps as someone walks very close to her. "Yes…her information was vital in leading Khan Basilio and Great Khan Flavia to their ambush sites."

Tharja's the MVP, it seems. "So who were the guys you were with?"

"Mercenaries…soldiers I managed to save from the Risen." Lucina says. "While I disagree with your teachings, I must admit your drive to preserve human lives is…admirable."

Huh. "Don't let a man die if you can use him?"

O…kay, she just almost drew her Falchion.

She sheathes her sword after a tense few seconds. "Apologies." She says softly.

"Don't worry about it." I shrug, not feeling as calm as I'm pretending.

Hmm…let's parse for a moment.

Lucina tips off Robin, so Robin comes up with Plan B.

Robin's Plan B is thwarted? We got ambushed still, but had enough speed to bail out of a surround…for a little while. Gangrel ultimately got behind us in the end and STILL surrounded us, though at a comparatively more terrain-neutral location.

_So yeah, it was thwarted._

Outmaneuvered by the other Robin…if that other Robin is in fact Grima!Robin and not just an asshole with white hair and some really lucky dice.

For the sake of safety, let's assume that the other Robin is in fact Grima.

_So why was he male?_

Fuck if I know. Morgan introduces the possibility that people can come from multiple timelines as opposed to just two…there is a chance that that particular version of Robin came from a different timeline as well...he did say "two of us", though I don't see why I should believe in someone who's probably opposed to my goals and my well being.

Not worth thinking about that for the time being.

…

I pound my fist into the sand in frustration (and startle Lucina in the process).

I also hit Nowi on her hand.

"Owch." Nowi rubs her hand. "What was that for?"

"Thinking." I growl.

"You're a very violent thinker." Nowi remarks, and leans on me.

I stare. "What are you doing?"

"Making you less violent." Nowi grins.

…

The reason of my frustration is, of course…

The fact that literally NOTHING has been resolved.

The war with Plegia had ended, sure. However, the war didn't have a proper start _anyway _and there wasn't a turning point event, like Emmeryn.

The Grimleal still had a hold on Plegia, and if they turn their attention inward (which they probably will) means that the country is going to hell in a burning handbasket.

The generals of Plegia (whoever they were, Mustafa aside) were nowhere to be seen…a battle featuring their king and the only war in the country, and they were nowhere to be seen.

_Both of the above factors point to the possibly of Grima being awakened earlier than normal._

The killing required to get Grima to wake his lazy gluttonous ass up is fortunately not the only requirement, but that's where that male Robin comes in.

Despite what he says, I don't know what he's here for. He obviously wasn't trying to kill us or he would've done so already.

Gangrel bailed out of Plegia, and he's now AWOL. I don't know what he's planning or if he's even sane to begin with.

Ylisse is broke.

Feroxi is broke.

Plegia, regardless of what the post-mission twelve cutscenes say, is probably also broke…at least in terms of gold not being controlled by the Grimleal.

_Uh…Jesus._

That is a long list of problems. Fuck.

Let's…focus on the main issues.

_What is the biggest problem?_

We have an aggressor (Plegia) who still has teeth.

_What is the second problem?_

We have an aggressor overseas (Walhart) who has a shitton of teeth.

_What is the last problem?_

We have an eldritch aggressor (Grima) who binge eats like my cat, and has a godly amount of teeth.

_What is the solution to all of these problems?_

…

Heh.

Heh heh.

_Lucina just saw our face and is now suitably alarmed._

…

Heh heh heh heh heh.

...

I have two years, better get this shit started.

"Hey, where are you going?" Nowi asks as I stand up.

I don't respond.

"Where is he going?" Nowi asks Lucina, who shrugs in reply.

...

Ah ha, there he is.

"Welcome back, Ash. Did you learn something useful from her?" Basilio asks.

"Kinda, sorta...but most importantly. Khan Basilio...I have a request."

.

.

.

{ === + === }

Author notes:

So...uh...

_Confession: Steam Christmas Sales is bad for maintaining a coherent update schedule._

I'm kind of rushing past the war with Gangrel, but it feels like if I added more action it would just be padding...bad padding.

_In other words we're bad and should feel bad._

Yes.


	17. Arc One Finale (Part Two)

He has to wait.

He has to wait.

I knew I should've gone to Flavia instead. Ugh.

"You know how it goes, Ash." Basilio had said.

I mean, I agreed, because what I want is going to require a lot of political capital, but if it goes through I'm going to be in good standing for the next two years…give or take.

But still.

…

The post-battle clean-up was…uneventful.

We helped Flavia and Basilio gather up the dead Feroxi soldiers (Chrom wanted to help the Plegians as well but Robin was having none of it) and their corpses were embalmed a little (something with healing staffs, I don't know). Chrom then tasked Fredrick to lead all of the mounted shepherds to escort the corpse wagons home to Ferox.

If…I don't really want to think about what the battle lines between Plegia and everyone else is like.

…

Come to think of it, during the game proper there really wasn't like a cessation of hostility treaty, was there? The good guys just mowed through the bad guys and it was like "ok, done."

_They probably glossed over that part; Flavia did mention taking gold from Plegian coffers._

…And during the canonical timeline Chrom was the leader of Ylisse, I forgot about that.

"What are you thinking about?"

…

JESUS.

CHRIST.

NOWI.

…

"Can you stop doing that?" I may or may not have had a heart attack.

"Aww." Nowi pouts and gives me a squeeze. I'm sitting down and she's not so she at least clears my waist. "But I wanted a hug."

I sigh, turn, and give Nowi a hug. "So what are you thinking about?" She asks again.

"Nothing in particular; it's just that…After the adrenaline settles, you know…"

Nowi nods. "War sucks, huh?"

I chuckle. "Yeah."

Nowi grins. "You need a lot of hugs then!" She th-Ow my goodness-dives into my chest for a glomp. "If you can't sleep at night, walk around a lot, ok?" She whispers.

_That's not weird at all._

Amelia lands nearby in her Pegasus. "Am I interrupting?" She asks with a grin.

Nowi's response is to laugh, disengage from me, and then tackle-glomp Amelia. "Yes!"

…

Once Nowi worked off a little bit of her hyperactivity and bounced away, Amelia walked over to me. "Robin wants a word with you."

"Can't imagine why." I mutter, and get to my feet.

"Hm." Amelia shrugs. "By the way…did Nowi say the same thing to you?"

The same…?

I look at her. "What, to take a walk if we can't sleep at night?"

She nods. "Yeah…that's something I usually hear from old veterans."

…

Huh.

…

…

I see our pretty tactician with her dirty coat and sandy white hair. "Robin, you want something?"

She turns to face me. "Kind of; I want to talk about that…man, you met during the attack."

I assume she means Male!Robin.

But just to be safe. "The guy that looked disconcertingly similar to you?"

She nods. "Yeah, him…from the fragments of Grima's memories, I don't remember seeing anyone like him."

…

"Whoa, whoa, wait, time out." My hands go up. "Grima's memories?"

"I don't know if this is because of Plegia's land or…something else." Robin sighs. "But lately I've been getting…weird…things, in my head. I'm assuming they're Grima's memories, since I can't fathom it being anything else."

_That's an incredibly tenuous assumption._

And it's the best one she can make. Ok, new plan: we keep Robin the fuck away from Plegia.

Robin plows on with the conversation. "Regardless, what do you think his goals are?"

His goals, huh…

"Honestly?" I lean on the wagon next to her. "I don't know. Him showing up in front of us did him nothing good."

She leans on the wagon as well. "It's common for people to overestimate their foe."

"Right." Villainous clichés and all that; I visit TV Tropes, I know what's going on. "Except he didn't feel…he didn't feel like he was gloating for the sake of gloating. I also don't think he was legitimately trying to kill us."

I almost said "me" but Cherche was there, too.

Robin adopts her thinking pose. "So why would he just show up out of nowhere?"

I shrug. "Apart from being on the payroll of Plegia? I have no clue. He literally could have killed us at any time but just wanted to show off. Fuck it, I don't know."

"Maybe he knows you, just like Marth." Robin muses. "Or whatever her name is."

...so who knows about Lucina's real name?

…I don't think anyone knows about Lucina's name. Lissa might know about Lucina's heritage though.

"Maybe." I nod. "That would make a lot more sense." I sigh. "I can't believe I'm saying this, but I hope Plegia's stability goes down the drain hard enough for him to ignore us for the next few years."

Robin makes a face. "How vile of you."

"I'm a realist." I grin.

…

[Next Week]

…

We hang out in Plegia a little longer for some final diplomacy stuff, nothing hugely important.

_And watch Plegia slowly go to hell in handbasket; apparently the nearby villages are already showing signs of looting._

Yeah.

…

Also, I feel like I'm being followed.

Let's…duck into this tent here…I'm a little worried that someone made it into our little camp while we're parked in the middle of nowhere.

"So, what gives?" I ask as soon as I see a shadow appear in the tent doorway.

The…oh, it's the spy I sent. I think. He looks vaguely familiar and I'm pretty sure an assassin wouldn't bow and be unarmed at the same time. "I come bearing good news."

Yay. "So, what gives?"

The spy nods. "Following the death of King Gangrel…or, rather, the death of his authority," right, because he didn't actually die. "Castle Plegia was…to be polite, a hellhole. Fortunately, we were able to secure the charges you intended for us."

…

I…oh, right. I intended for them to go save Mustafa's family. "Go on."

He nods again. "We were able to secure the safety of the general's family, and we hid them long enough for General Mustafa himself to appear. As of our final conversation he is currently fleeing with his family to the western territories of Plegia."

Well, good for him, I suppose. At least something went right.

"Is there anything else you require of us?" The spy asks.

"Nah, that's about the only thing I needed…" Which…is incredibly untrue. "Well, it's the only thing I feel safe sending you guys to go after."

He stares at me. "You sent us to help save political prisoners. What can possibly be harder?"

_Spy on a conqueror, spy on a smartass. Take your pick._

Actually, if you think about it…anarchy is the best time for spy work…then again, I'm pretty sure if I sent spies after Male!Robin he definitely would find out right now.

"I'll probably need you guys in a few months from now." I say. "Right now though…I got nothing; good work on securing Mustafa's family."

The spy bows. "Of course. We'll return to our original duties. Come find us in Ylisse if you need anything else done right." He chuckles, and then vanishes.

I should get him to teach me to do that.

"Ash?" A girl's voice says from outside. "Is there something wrong?" Sounds like Nino.

"Nah, I'm good." I should probably get out of this tent that most likely doesn't belong to me.

"Ok, sure." Nino mumbles as I get out of the tent.

_This was probably Nino's tent._

Yay RomCom situations.

…

[Back on the march again]

…

The trip back to Ylisse is similarly uneventful.

_"Uneventful."_

…

Yeah.

No Risen attacks, no banditry, no nothing.

I guess it's too early to have total and utter breakdown of law and order, especially if the other generals that we didn't see aren't going to try anything yet.

_Maybe that's what the other Robin is doing. Holding things together._

He didn't strike me as having a lot of political capital, so I can't really see him doing a lot in terms of swaying the populace or the military.

…

As we got closer to the actual combat line though…

"Whoa, this looks really bad."

I follow Ricken's line of sight after hearing him speak.

…

I…I don't think sand is supposed to be that color.

"How many people do you think died here?" I ask.

Ricken's response: "Lots."

…

Y'know what? I'm ok with that response.

_Corpse wagons dot the red sand. We're not entirely sure how long the battle was but as far as first impressions go the Plegian and Ylissean armies collided with each other and then stuck there for the next few days._

There is a lot of equipment just littered on the ground…most of it seems to be armor pieces, judging by the glint.

…

Y'know, if this is what the Plegian war is like…we're going to kill so many people in the war with Walhart.

It might be better if Emmerian tried to talk it out with him instead.

…

…

…

Ylissean territory, we're finally home…

This isn't a lot better.

I don't know if it's the difference between grassland and sand, but Ylisse looks a lot more…burned out.

"Supposedly Plegian Wyvern Riders were harassing the supply lines nonstop." Robin murmurs to me. "Ylissean Pegasus Knights are good, but they can't keep up when it comes to raw speed."

"So what do the common folk think about Emmeryn now?" I ask her.

She shrugs. "No idea."

"My sister has done what is right." Chrom says confidently. "I believe her."

Well…that's all fine and good, but you are not your country, Chrom.

…

…

…

So the return trip took the better part of a week.

_Almost two weeks, actually._

We weren't hurrying or anything; Chrom (or Robin, it sounded more like Robin's idea) insisted that we stop as frequently as possible to help the locals out whenever we could. Banditry was at an all-time low, which is nice, so most of the problems involved cleaning up fields from burning debris, healing the wounded and the sick, and so forth.

And fighting off the Risen that still rain from the skies on the occasion that they do rain from the skies.

The good part is most of the village guards are so damn good at fighting off said Risen right now that only the really strong ones (read: Heroes, Generals, and so on) give them trouble.

Anyways, after a good two weeks of slowly going back to Ylisstol, we made it back to Ylisstol.

…

It's no burning husk of a castle, but the siege damage is certainly still present…if you look really hard. A few houses are being rebuilt, sections of the wall shows signs of damage…everyone is still a little on edge when a Wyvern flies over the city, nearly getting Minerva shot to death.

_You know: the usual._

…

"Chrom, you're alright." Emmeryn says as she gives her little brother a hug…good thing we're not at court, huh? Lissa gets a much tighter hug, enough to make her struggle for freedom and complain while doing it.

"Thank you, Robin, for preserving the lives of my family and my friends." Emmeryn deeply bows to Robin, who looks sheepish.

"You don't have to bow, your eminence; I did what I could…" Robin frowns. "Though I wish the war could have been resolved sooner."

"So do all of us, Robin." Chrom says tiredly. "Sis, how's the rest of Ylisse? From what we saw it didn't look too good."

"Most of the damage was limited to the areas closest to the border." Emmeryn says. "So the rest of the country is fine…the rapid response team is running itself ragged to assist the populace in any way it can."

"Geez…and here I thought we had it bad, going through the entire desert." Lissa groans.

"We're shepherds, and our flock needs us." Fredrick has that creepy smile on his face again.

"Sir Ash." Emmeryn turns to me.

I will never get used to being addressed with a title. "Just Ash is fine; what can I do for you?"

"What are your thoughts on Plegia's situation? Is there anyone in the country we can rely on?"

…

Robin gives Emmeryn and me weird looks. Weird looks copied by Fredrick, Chrom, and Lissa.

I'm not entirely sure where she's headed to. "That we can rely on…for what, maintaining stability?"

Emmeryn nods.

"Ash, it's time for your debriefing." Robin says sweetly…terrifyingly sweetly.

Nervous face-scratching. "Maybe…there are two characters of interest; General Mustafa is apparently an honorable man to his soldiers and the people, and it was his allegiance that I tried to secure."

"Tried to?" Fredrick scowls.

"I accomplished my goals to get him on our good side; I don't know if that will add up to anything or not." I shrug. "Anyways, besides him, there is…another factor."

"That guy that looks strangely like me, right?" Robin mutters, getting some of the weird looks thrown her way.

I nod. "Yep. I still don't know what he's up to, but for the time being he should be considered to be definitely against us…that being said, I don't think he can move with Plegia going to hell in a hand basket right now."

"Hand basket?" Lissa giggles. "That's something new."

Emmeryn nods. "Can we give support to this Mustafa?"

Wow. War's not even over for a month and she's trying to make connections…girl knows her diplomacy. "Not at the moment. If the rest of Plegia finds out that we support one of their generals then things will get nasty for him."

She sighs. "So be it."

…

And then we stood there awkwardly for a minute.

…

"On an entirely different note." Robin says hurriedly, eager to change the subject. "Chrom, how are things going with Sumia?"

Chrom, kind of predictably, looks utterly shocked.

Emmeryn perked up at the news. Lissa kind of already knew (Fredrick did too).

Chrom x Sumia is kind the go-to couple so I wasn't surprised.

_But it sure as hell didn't stop the grin from spreading on your face._

"Uh…things. Things are going on." Chrom tries valiantly to dodge the question.

Too bad it's Robin on the other side. "Don't give me that! You even bought a ring!"

Lissa squeals in delight and gets a dirty look from Chrom.

Chrom's dirty look earns him Emmeryn's hand on his shoulder. Chrom is now terrified and looking to the rest of us for help.

Fredrick's poker face is incredible.

I just gave him a "you're on your own" shrug.

…

…

"One week. One week…my goodness he's working fast." Robin laughs.

Emmeryn has the castle going full scale to prepare for the wedding, and the rest of the populace is just as excited as the rest of us.

_If she's using her own brother as a stability tool then she's way more gray than we thought._

Let's just call it "capitalizing on a good thing."

"Do you have anyone like that yet, Ash?" Robin asks, leaning against the balcony railing.

Eh.

I shake my head. "Can't say I do; I like a lot of people in the Shepherds but I wouldn't say…well, you know."

_The night breeze is cool and feels really, really damn good. Good to finally have a true day off for once._

"Really now?" Robin's mischievous grin returns…haven't seen that in a while. "You seem pretty close to Nowi."

I chuckle. "I think Nowi's pretty close to _me._" Speaking of Nowi, unlike the videogame where she sticks around for the sake of unit roster convenience, once it became clear that the war was over Nowi left the group as soon as we entered Ylissean territory to go exploring.

_That's a bit of a hyperbole: she stuck around for the first week, but left during the beginning of the second week._

"Yeah, it's not like she'll settle down any time soon…what was with her, though?" Robin frowns. "She acts like a brat but she sometimes talks like someone way over her age."

Because she is way over her age. "Who knows?" I'm not sure if they know she's a Manakete since she didn't transform once during the campaign.

"Would you have married her though?" Robin teases.

I…

…

Ok, let's back up for a second.

My desire to avoid marrying Nowi is literally based around the fact that she looks young and thus would make ME look bad.

What the hell?

…

I shake my head. "Not especially. She's adorable and fun to be around, but I have shit I need to get done within the next two years." And I'm not going to get it done playing around with Nowi.

Robin cocks her head and stares at me. "Most people your age would be married now, I think."

…

"As far as my extended family goes, I'm the only unmarried one." I shrug. "Doesn't bother me much."

Five male cousins, a spate of female cousins, and I'm the only one without a girlfriend, wife, child, or child-on-the-way.

And I'm almost the youngest of the group…and I'm twenty-five.

"Your family? Do you miss them?" Robin asks gently.

Oh lordy.

_To be totally honest? No. We're a pretty heartless bunch._

But saying that out loud would be poor manners. "A little; I try not to think about it."

"Really?"

I nod. "Really…we're slowly running out of time, a lot of people are going to die. I don't want to let them die just because I was too busy feeling sorry for myself."

She chuckles. "Or you're just trying to run away from something."

…

_I lean on the balcony railing as well; we're standing side by side, enjoying the night breeze._

"That too."

_It's going to be pretty hot soon._

…

"I've been meaning to ask." Robin says suddenly as we get back inside. "You were talking to Basilio way back when; what was that all about?"

She saw that? "That…that's only valuable to you if it works out."

"Well, what happens if it works out?"

I drum on the stone wall of the castle as a habit. "If it works out, I quit from the Shepherds for two years and move to Ferox." Feroxi west coast, to be precise.

"You and everyone else." She sighs.

"Hey, Nowi's the only one who effectively went AWOL."

She blinks. "What's AWOL?"

"Away WithOut Leave…though I guess it's a bit unfair since she did leave us a note."

"Really now…so who are you taking with you?"

_We stop cold in our tracks._

DAMN she's sharp.

"Cherche, if she agrees to it."

Robin's mischievous grin is back again. "And you said you didn't have anyone in mind!"

_Damage control! Damage control!_

"I meant it!"

Judging by Robin's laugh echoing down the hallway as she rushes away...she didn't believe me.

…

[Dinnertime]

…

Virion has cornered me.

"A little bird told me you have your eyes on my faithful knight." Virion says in his best intimidating voice.

_We're just sitting at a table enjoying pie._

"If that little bird mentioned anything about love, she lied." I say flatly.

"Aha! So it was true." Virion sits down across from me and DUDE that's my pie.

_We have four pies; these things are TINY. Well, we have three now._

I sigh. "It isn't."

"So what's it about, then?" He asks through a bite of theft!Pie.

_Non-sequitor: this is the best chicken pie I've ever had._

No avoiding it. "I want her to teach me to fly."

Virion stops cold. "She won't do it. She wouldn't even teach me, her retainer!"

"Well, I plan to ask, and if she declines, then so be it; I'll figure out another way."

"Why do ya want to learn to fly so much, Ash?" Donnel, who overheard, asks.

_Donnel also takes a seat, but he's at least cultured enough to avoid stealing more of our pie._

There isn't any pie left to steal. "Because I'm really bad on foot." I shrug. "I'm not much of a soldier. If I'm going to take to the field, I'd rather do it under my circumstances."

"You are more of an intellect than a warrior." Virion agrees. "Do your many inventions not allow you to fly?"

I pause. "Uh…not without a lot of sacrifices; the wind spell available to me is either too weak to overcome the combined mass of myself and the engine, or it's too powerful and I'll die from the G-forces…never mind the fuel cost or the aerodynamics."

"Arrow…what?" Viron asks, intrigued.

"Aerodynamics, basically the study of how things interact with the air." I probably got that wrong, but nobody's going to figure that out for centuries. "Like learning how to build fake birds and get them to fly."

"Your Outrealm sounds mighty amazin', Ash." Donnel says slowly.

_No shit, boy. Our Outrealm MADE you._

"It has its good and bad." I shrug. "Point being, it's too expensive to fly on my own, so I need to learn to do it the old fashioned way."

"Then perhaps it would be best to resolve this issue right here." Virion says, and then scans the room for Cherche.

Fuck if you're going to yell across the whole damn room when Robin might have told literally EVERYONE

"Cherche! Ash would like to have a word with you."

_Virion yells loud enough for the entire dining hall to hear (it's not the main dining hall, so whatever) but everyone in attendance, Robin included, go quiet._

…

Fuck.

…

"You did that on purpose." I growl.

"Of course. I never do things in half measures." Virion says smugly as Cherche approaches our table.

"Yes?" Cherche smiles at me…while standing over the seated me. I feel small.

"I…uh, within the next two years I plan to do something remarkably stupid; do you want to teach me to fly in the meantime?"

Robin audibly groans from the other side of the room. "That's not how you propose!" she yells.

I want to yell something back but Cherche is within the "do not shout" range.

_Cherche is, at the very least, thinking it over._

"You have my permission to go, should you consider it a worthy cause." Virion says after a moment.

Cherche turns to him and nods. "Thank you, your highness."

_Spoken with just a little bit of snark in that title._

She then turns to me. "Obtaining a Wyvern who trusts you might be difficult, but I am willing to teach you everything I know."

Robin wolf whistles. I know for a fact she can't hear a thing we said but goddammit is she rolling with whatever scenario she has planned in her head right now.

_Cherche turns around to face the room at large and within the next fifteen seconds all of them lost all forms of interest and returned to their meals…very quickly and quietly._

She would make for a terrifyingly efficient school teacher.

…

[Next day]

…

_We mind our own business in the library (Nino is somewhere in here) and read up on old books with horrible handwriting._

"Yo, Ash." I hear a man and feel a hand come down on my shoulder.

"Basilio; how've you been?" I smile and put away the book I was reading. Judging by the handwriting I think its writer used to be a doctor.

He looks kind of stern. "I am doing wonderfully…can we talk?" He says.

Moment of truth time.

_We nod and lead Basilio to a small side room._

"Alright, so I talked with Flavia about your plan." Basilio says as soon as I close the door. "She's all for it." He grimaces. "Frankly, the going-ons of the other continent has never been in Ferox's consideration, but if Walhart is as ambitious as you say he is, then it's definitely good for us to start preparing just in case."

Thank. God. "Virion is probably the best example of what Walhart can do."

"Virion?" Basilio raises an eyebrow. "That peacock? What does he have to do with anything?"

"Virion is a lord of one of the conquered territories." I say. "Cherche is his retainer; as far as I know they escaped during the early days of their war."

"And any man crazy enough to conquer a continent won't be satisfied with just one." Basilio growls. "Flavia made the right call then…alright, so here's what you get."

_Basilio rests his elbow on his knee, and his knuckle on his face… the tough guy thinking pose._

Basilio opens his free hand. "You will get a title of nobility from Ferox, which will make you a minor Feroxi Noble. The Feroxi Great Khan Flavia will provide you with a small stipend of gold and you'll receive a residence in a coastal town on the western edge of Ferox." He ticks off each benefit with a finger. "Your demands weren't all that demanding for a war hero, Ash; what do you have planned? Flavia won't fund your entire project, and I'm sure as hell the starting gold is nowhere near enough…"

"I got my plans, Basilio, don't worry." I grin.

He shrugs. "You're like Robin, only weirder; fine, fine…and as for your request…" He leans forward. "We can't exactly afford to spend troops right after a war, but I will grant you…at best, forty Pegasus Knights at the end of the year; that is the best I can hope to do right now."

Whew. "Forty is plenty, thanks."

"What do you plan to do with forty Pegasus knights?" Basilio asks. "I'm sure they're all going to be beautiful, but…"

What in the hell… "What kind of man do you take me for?" I roll my eyes, because if I had absolute power I DEFINITELY would have a harem of Pegasus knights. "Having air power is central to my plans against Walhart in the future."

_A harem with Florina as the lead._

"I see…so be it. I plan to visit whenever I have spare time." Basilio grins. "It's going to be a busy two years for you, isn't it?"

I nod. "But if everything goes well Walhart won't know what hit him." Nobody will know…

And it will be glorious.

…

"What were you guys talking about?" Nino asks as soon as we left the private room.

Basilio grins. "Ash here is going places."

Nino looks confused.

…

…

[The rest of the week, leading up to the wedding]

…

_We sat in our room, meticulously drawing out diagrams, plans, writing down notes and planning possible courses of action to take in the months to come._

_…_

…

Whew…and here I thought I hated putting things down on paper.

_Considering all the delegation of duty we need to do there isn't much of a choice._

I know, right?

…

I hear a knock on my door.

_Actually that's been there for a while._

Let's go see who it is…wow my room is a mess right now.

I open the door. "Yeah?"

It was Lissa. "Ash! They're going to start the What in the heavens happened here?!" She exclaims (and then gets sidetracked after seeing the contents of my room).

"I was busy." I shrug.

_Crumpled papers litter the floor, along with broken quills and empty ink bottles._

At least the stack of books I have on my desk is neat.

"If Maribelle ever sees this she'll go insane." Lissa mutters. "Chrom's gonna get married in an hour! Why aren't you ready for it yet?!"

Uh…I thought I had a little more time. "Sorry, sorry…" I'm not really sorry though.

"Come on!" She drags me out of the room. "Hey!" She calls out to a gaggle of maids. "Clean him up for Chrom!"

All of them snap to attention. "At once, Lady Lissa!" and then drag me off to…probably a bath.

I'm too tired to care right now. What time is it?

_Probably morning._

I vaguely remember Robin saying something about the ceremony being held in the morning-ish, so let's say it's around 9 in the morning.

"Sir, we'll have a fresh set of clothing delivered for you shortly." One of the maids point me to the huge-ass castle bath.

I nod. "Sure. Thanks."

…

…

_We enter the bath._

Ah…this feels good.

Nothing beats a good soak. I need to have one of these at my new house. Maybe not this large, but…

"So."

OH JESUS WELL I almost jumped out of my skin for that one.

Virion is on the other end of the bath.

This is honestly more of a swimming pool than a bath, except it lacks the depth…

_Our mind is wandering because we are tired._

"A little bird told me you're planning something…big."

…

_An ex-lord would be pretty well connected._

Shit. "Yeah, planning; whether if it's going to actually be big or not depends on what happens for the next few months." I yawn.

"I suppose your week of utter recluse was for your preparations?" He…glares? At me.

No, not really glares, but it's the kind of piercing gaze you get when someone is trying to interrogate you.

Virion's not too good at it; Fredrick is better.

"You got it." I sink lower into the water. "If everything goes well, Walhart won't know what hit him."

…Huh.

I don't think Virion knew that part, going by the fact that his eyes went wide.

"You…what are you planning to do, Ash?" Virion says in a warning tone. "Walhart should not be underestimated."

I laugh. "I'm not." though in all seriousness I probably am; a continent and one million men isn't something easily grasped. "I plan to bring all the fury of the Outrealms onto Walhart's face."

Virion frowns. "And you're sure he won't find out beforehand?"

…shit. "Good point…I don't think he will, but I'll take some safety measures just in case."

Spies are a thing that happens, and if I don't want to de-tooth myself before the fighting begins then…

_We'll need to have a forest to hide our trees in._

"And I suppose Cherche is teaching you to fly as an advantage against Walhart." Virion sighs. "Ash, Rosanne had the strongest Wyvern Riders in Valm, a fact which you might be aware of—"

_We weren't, but it explains why he could reclass to Wyverns._

"—we had the utter advantage in the air against Walhart, who had nothing." Virion then stopped…his eyes look sad.

But I can see where he's going. If Walhart could overcome a total loss of air dominance when he had no Pegasus Knights or Wyvern Knights (or at least not enough to matter) then he's going to be near impossible to crack with air cover.

…

Well, if we abided by the current rules of combat, anyways.

"Virion. I'm going to give you a...an idea, of what I'm thinking of."

He sighs. "Go on."

"Well…quick question first. What separates Valm from us?"

"The ocean." He says tonelessly.

_He looks so apprehensive at our shenanigans._

Also that word is impressively hard to spell. "And how will Valm move troops over the ocean?"

Virion sighs. "I fail to see how you can safeguard the entire coast against an invasion fleet…nor how stopping an invasion will stop Valm."

I grin. My grin is so wide my face hurts. But fuck do I grin.

_This is going to be SO GOOD._

…

…

On the plus side, we managed to confuse the hell out of Virion, and he seems to (grudgingly) believe that we have something up our sleeve.

On the…not-quite-a-minus side we have a wedding to be slightly late for.

And late we were, although goddammit I am well dressed for the wedding.

_It's a mark of how much presence Chrom has when literally nobody noticed that we were late for it._

…

Wow that dress is huge…that is Sumia under there, right?

…

_While the wedding continues…interestingly enough the Fire Emblem is used as a ceremonial piece._

…

Yeah, the amount of fucks I give about this wedding is literally zero. I want to get my stuff together and get to work.

_Unfortunately other people noticed._

What?

"You don't seem too happy." Maribelle remarks…I'm not liking the way she's handling that parasol.

_The ceremony has ended, and everyone is celebrating._

I smile. "Oh, I am…my attention is just elsewhere."

Maribelle sniffs. "Sure…are you the type of person to abandon someone else after they have exhausted their use?"

…

What? "I don't know what you mean."

"Your…future." Maribelle says slowly.

Everybody knows?

_Rumors fill the absence of information, and we didn't do a good job stopping people from realizing that we asked Cherche to do things._

Point taken. "My future is perfectly fine…? I'm not sure what you're getting at."

"Oh, really? You're leaving Ylisse for Ferox, and you consider that fine?" Maribelle snaps.

"Yeah, I'm not married to Ylisse or Chrom." I scowl. "Besides, Ferox and Ylisse are allies…hell, practically blood brothers. I'm not going to limit myself just for the sake of appearing to be an ally of Chrom when I can be somewhere else and actually help him."

That makes her think for a minute.

"I see." She says eventually. "What does Cherche have to do with your goals, then?"

"She's literally the best Wyvern rider I've seen, so I figured learning from her is the best way to go." I shrug.

Maribelle stares at me for a little while longer.

Hum. "What, do you want to be with me?" Let's throw in a creepy little grin just for kicks.

She…goes a little red, but otherwise doesn't answer.

"Well, if you're ever have time free, come visit." I raise my glass to her (with only juice, fortunately) "It's not like the two nations will be at war or anything."

_Did we just skim over the wedding?_

Uh…

Chrom is happy! Sumia is happy! Cordelia is pretending to be happy! Everyone claps and there's shittons of confetti! A lot of ribbing on the rest of the Shepherds for not getting married yet!

_There we go._

"As if I will have the time for that, since I will be a Major Noble and such." Maribelle says with an uppity little grin.

…

"When do you leave?" Maribelle asks.

Hmm… "As soon as I can…so probably tomorrow."

"To…you won't even stay for the celebrations, I see." Maribelle looks shocked.

Why is she still shocked at my bullshit? "I have a lot of work to cover and very little time…and if I don't meet my goals then people can die."

She blinks. "Let me guess…our friends across the ocean."

I like nobles for their ability to know about world news. "You got it."

…

…

I spend the rest of the day talking to people and getting to leave.

I don't feel like rehashing the same conversation fifty times.

Of everyone I talked to (or asked me) Maribelle and Miriel were the only ones that had a little bit of an issue with me leaving.

_Not Fredrick?_

Fredrick was perfectly ok with me being far away from his charge. Apparently he still doesn't really trust me.

…

…

[The next day, Departure]

...

FUCK YES WE CAN GET THE TECHNOLOGY SHOW ON THE ROAD!

_The Shepherds came for a cursory send-off; considering we're billing this as essentially an extended business trip they were pretty ok with it._

I'll send chocolate home every so often or something.

…

…

Road trip alone is boring.

_We have our own horse, but we essentially joined a caravan headed for Ragno Ferox as an impromptu bodyguard._

It waives my travelling fees, so that's good…although not having my special weapons makes me a little worried.

…

_So now what?_

Now…we do some horrible, horrible things in the world.

"Ash!"

OH JESUS CHRIST

_Nowi has hitched a ride on our horse. This is all because you called the road trip boring._

.

.

.

{ === + === }

Author Notes:

55 minutes left for Valentine's day (2015). Happy Valentines~!

Or happy Single Awareness day if you're like me.


	18. Interlude - 1

[Two Months Later]

…

…

A very bored (and suffering) Robin looked up at the blue sky.

"Enjoying your afternoon off, Robin?" Maribelle asks stiffly with her signature parasol shielding herself from the sun.

"Ylisse is way too hot in the summer." Robin groans, sitting up from the stone bench in the castle courtyards.

Maribelle smirks slightly. "It's just perfectly fine for us Ylisseans…although I have to admit," she fans herself with a small fan. "This year is a bit worse than usual."

"If I knew it was going to be this bad I would've left for Ferox too." Robin groans.

Maribelle rolls her eyes. "It's always nice to be reminded of your allegiance."

Robin shoots up to her feet. "Forget it. I'm taking a long bath. You're coming with me."

"I'm doing what now?" Maribelle asked alarmingly as Robin drags her off into the massive Ylissean bath.

…

"So how does it look?" Maribelle asks once the two girls immersed themselves in the cool, clear water. "The Plegian situation, I mean."

Robin sighs. "Not good at all. The breakdown in Plegia is a lot worse than I expected."

Maribelle shoots Robin a sharp glance. "Sounds like you—"

"Sent spies, yes." Robin nods without a hint of remorse. "Apparently the Plegian generals have carved up Plegia into territories, and they're ruling them like good old-fashioned feudal lords."

"And this is worse than expected because…" Maribelle eggs her on.

"It's worse because the generals are almost constantly vying for territory against each other." Robin says. "It's almost as if they're not satisfied just being a general."

Maribelle caught the slight edge in Robin's tone. "So there's more to it than just petty politics."

"You got it." Robin nods. "The spies I sent can't go any deeper than the territories surrounding Ylisse, but based on what they've seen an outside party is masquerading as the army of each general…and they're attacking the supply lines that the generals established; as you can imagine, neither the generals nor the people they've sworn to protect are happy about this arrangement."

"Do they know who it is?"

"It's not Ash, that's for sure." Robin laughs darkly. "Whoever it is has an almost godlike knowledge of Plegia's inner workings; my money's on the Grimleal, though I can't imagine why they would do something like this."

Robin's insides squirmed just a little at that: She knew perfectly well why the Grimleal would shed more blood, but decided against telling it to Maribelle…no point making her more stressed than normal.

"Damn them…maybe Chrom's father knew what he was doing after all." Maribelle mutters.

Robin blinks in surprise. "Better not let him hear that."

"I don't believe Chrom's father was right in conducting wholesale genocide." Maribelle backtracks. "But I do believe he knew a bit more than we're assuming." She adds in an undertone.

The two spends the next few moments in contemplative silence.

…

"So how's Lissa?" Robin asks after the silence became too stifling.

Maribelle mimes gagging. "As her best friend, Lissa is a bit insufferable...especially when Stahl is around."

Somewhere in the past week (likely after Lon'qu had gone back to Ferox with Olivia) Lissa and Stahl became an "official" couple.

"Official" because neither would publicly declare anything.

Robin shakes her head slightly. "Well…at least it's nice to know Lon'qu didn't leave her totally heartbroken."

"I doubt if the two actually dated…or if Lon'qu ever had eyes for her." Maribelle sniffs. "Regardless…"

"Are we gonna have a second royal marriage soon?" Robin asks excitedly with a spark in her eyes.

"Seeing as the other party is Stahl, I doubt it." Maribelle says sadly. "Lissa might not care about her status, but Stahl will."

Robin tilts her head quizzically. "I don't understand." Stahl never struck her as a man who cared about station.

"Stahl isn't the world's most mediocre man because he was born into the position." Maribelle says simply.

"World's most mediocre?" Robin echoes. "How?"

She could, naturally, see the mobile defense platform that is Stahl (except against magical attacks).

"Who knows?" Maribelle shrugs. "It's what Miriel calls him."

…

…

Speaking of Stahl, the Cavalier was presently occupied with obtaining his new equipment.

Like the majority of the Shepherds, Stahl received a promotion due to the campaign in Plegia (One he felt he didn't deserve), and opted to become a Great Knight.

As such, he spent the past week or so getting his new armor made and fitted.

"Goodness, this is heavy." Stahl grunted as he put on the bulky chest armor. "I'm almost having second thoughts about this."

"Man up, you wanted this." Vaike grinned. Vaike's upgrade consisted of a larger axe (which he was perfectly ok with).

"That may be so, but still." Stahl finished binding up the rest of the armor. "I don't see how Fredrick does this all day." He muttered.

"Through constant training, Stahl." Fredrick smiles. "Training that I'm sure will benefit you as well."

"Oh shit." Vaike muttered and hurriedly scanned the armory for a way out. Unfortunately the only way out of the armory was presently occupied by Fredrick.

"I uh…I think I'll take it slow." Stahl said hesitantly, scooting away from Fredrick as quickly as his new armor will allow.

"Nonsense. A knight must be ready at all times." Fredrick's smile didn't budge an inch, as he took purposeful strides toward the increasingly terrified Stahl.

…

…

[That Afternoon]

…

…

"Your Highness Emmeryn, the Far Striders have returned."

Emmeryn smiled as Sully walked into the throne room. "Thank you." She said to the messenger, who bowed and retreated.

Sully, the new commander of the renamed fast reaction cavalry company, kneeled in front of Emmeryn's throne. "Yo, your Eminence." Sully said as she got back up, without any tone of reverence.

Emmeryn smiles. "It's good to see you back safe and sound."

Sully grimaces. "Yeah, wish I can say that for everyone." She then stood to attention. "In our mission to assist the western edge of Ylisse, we ran into multiple Risen groups…all of fairly strong combat power."

Emmeryn frowns as the other court nobles murmur at this news. "Fairly strong?"

Sully nods. "Yeah. They're definitely a cut above the ones we've seen around the castle. Miriel thinks it's because the Risen is somehow benefitting from the magical energy of the area, but we don't really have any leads."

Emmeryn frowns slightly_. As they get closer to the sacred grounds, huh... _"What else?" Emmeryn asks.

"Slaver activity has increased around the western coast. We saw a few more raiders than normal but it wasn't anything serious." Sully shrugs.

"I see; thank you for your report." Emmeryn bows, a gesture that Sully returns in kind.

"Damn slavers, as if we don't have enough to worry about already." One of the nobles growled as Sully turned and left the court.

"They're what we'd call a necessary evil, Mister Miner." Another noble says breezily.

"I am aware." The one called Mister Miner (due to his ownership of mines and slaves to work said mines) snapped back. "However, I do not condone kidnapping as a reasonable livelihood…or a method of acquiring more workers."

"Sure you don't." The other noble chuckled in an undertone.

"That's enough." Emmeryn said gently, but firmly. "We are in court, please behave yourselves."

"My apologies." The noble said in a tone that was anything but apologetic. Mister Miner said nothing, and only glared at the noble in response.

"Onward to our next issue then." Emmeryn's Steward said hurriedly. "The loss of crop yield due to the war against Plegia…"

…

…

[Ferox, Western Coast]

…

…

Ash sat up slowly and grimaces at the weight resting on his stomach.

"Nowi, stop sneaking into my room." He said tiredly.

"I didn't sneak; I came in fair and square." Nowi mumbles into the bed.

"Of course you did." Ash sighs. "Ninya, stop letting her in." He says toward the slightly open bedroom door.

The maid standing behind the door salutes. "Yes sir!"

"Why do you still call her Ninya?" Nowi said into the bed sheet as Ash edged out of the bed.

"Because it's cute." Ash shrugs. "Ninya, what does my day look like?"

"Sir." Nina hands Ash a notebook. "You have a meeting with the Blacksmith Guildmaster later this morning, and one with the Dockmasters this afternoon."

"Fuckin' hell. Preparation is a pain in the ass." Ash growls. "Alright, let's get this party started."

…

…

[Two weeks later]

…

[1st Person Camera]

…

…

"Sir, there's someone here to see you."

…

Fuckin' hell, what now?!

"Calm down, jeez; not everyone's out to get you, Ashy." Nowi giggles.

_We stand up from our table._

"Really? It doesn't feel like that right now." I sigh. "Who is it, Ninya?"

"Hey! Let me in already!"

…

That sounds like Robin.

That sounds like Robin pounding on my door.

What is she doing out here?

…

"Yo, Robin. What brings you to the coast?" I say after Nina lets Robin into the…closest thing to a living room and she plops down on the makeshift sofa.

_Makeshift because we stole a bench and just layered a lot of wool onto it. It's really soft._

We didn't steal a bench. It was "acquisitioned". It is really soft though, as evidenced by Robin bouncing on it with a happy expression.

"Wow, this is really comfy." Robin says. "You're doing pretty well here, I see."

"As well I as I can expect. Also, Nowi." I say (and finish with a sigh) as Nowi bounces down the stairs and enthusiastically jump into Robin's chest for a hug.

Robin, as expected, looks suitably surprised. "You're living together? When did this happen?"

_Given by the grin creeping onto her face she's not exactly unpleased with this arrangement._

I shake my head. "She's freeloading."

"Not freeloading." Nowi retorts. "You make me work for the bed."

_Robin oohs._

I grin. "Damn straight. And if you did any of it you wouldn't be freeloading."

Nowi sticks her tongue out at me.

"Also, Nina, my trusty maid." I gesture at Nina (who looks a lot like Lute from Sacred Stones, only not as evil or short). Nina bows in response.

"I didn't figure you for the aristocratic type." Robin says in surprise, looking around the house again.

_It's pretty bare; apart from the kickass sofa the rest of the house is simple and bare. At least it would've been except Ninya keeps trying to decorate the place._

We just let her do it too.

"Unfortunately master is incapable of keeping himself alive." Ninya says with a self-satisfied grin.

Robin raises an eyebrow at me.

"It's true." Nowi says. "He only goes home if she reminds him."

_Nowi jumps off of Robin's chest and sits next to her._

Robin ponders this information for a minute. "You really don't take good care of yourself, do you?"

Shake head slightly. "Not at all; it'll get better once I get less busy though."

Robin glares at me. "What have you been busy with anyways? Lon'qu at least sends mail every other week."

"Well Lon'qu lives closer…and I'm pretty sure Olivia writes the mail." Basilio was very happy that the two of them returned to his court. "Anyways, I've been busy setting up the framework for my plans. It's going about as well as expected, politics notwithstanding."

"Politics." Robin repeats in total deadpan.

I nod. "Yeah. I spent a lot of time getting on the good side of the blacksmiths and the dock workers…so now I can safely say that the plan has successfully entered stage one."

"How many stages do you have?" Robin sounds indignant.

"A lot…why are you here, actually? It takes like a week for you to get here from Ylisse via flying." And I'm pretty sure Robin wasn't flying.

I don't think Robin likes me enough to travel across the continent for just an afternoon visit.

"You know the Plegian territory south of here?" Robin says, gesturing with her arm towards what is probably the south. Compass directions aren't my thing.

"Yeah?"

"I'm going there as an envoy. I thought I'd stop by and save a little pocket money." She grins.

"Of course." I sigh. "Take Nowi while you're at it."

_Nowi goes "hey!"_

Hmm…south of us.

_The town that we're living in doesn't necessarily share a border with Plegian territory, but we're close enough for it to be a very fast horse ride. That being said, there aren't any large population centers on the Feroxi coast except for this one; Plegia has dominated the ocean for a long time now and Ferox saw no reason to expand their naval powers to match._

South of us…I'm pretty sure south of us is Mustafa's territory. He carved it out of the burning, sinking ship that is the rest of Plegia before the whole thing went belly up. All things considered he's holding onto it pretty well if the traders that go from here to his capital are to be believed.

"South…so, what, Emmeryn's reaching out?" I ask Robin.

"Who knows?" She shrugs in response. "But she's certainly adamant about finding out who we can rally in Plegia to help pick up the pieces once their people stop trying to burn every little thing to the ground."

And she picked out Mustafa, despite them being on opposite corners of the world…

Hang on. "And Chrom sent you?"

That earned me a glare from Robin. "What's that supposed to mean?"

Backpedal. "You're pretty much the second in command of the Shepherds. I can't see him letting you go as a diplomat."

"Chrom figured it would show goodwill." Robin says simply. "Given what we gathered on Mustafa he seems a lot closer to Chrom than to your average noble anyways."

And Robin already befriended one Chrom-type noble.

_If it worked once it will work again._

"I head out tomorrow morning. What are you working on? Show me." Robin says quickly.

…

Well, since she came all this way. "Alright, alright. It's not inside the house though." I stop leaning against the wall.

Robin positively sprung up to her feet.

"Ninya, watch the house." I say as I usher Robin out of the door, with Nowi tagging along because Nowi.

"Yes, sir."

_Nina says with a bow that we don't see because we've already left the house._

…

…

_We lead Robin across town, to a very large collection of buildings behind a large and hefty looking gate._

"Do you own all of this?" Robin glances around the buildings once we've entered said gate.

"It's a joint ownership with the local guild…well, the local guild and then some." Let's see, the main office was over here…

_We lead Robin into a small wooden building marked "Manager"._

"Ah! Ash, you're here early." The master smith in said office waves at me.

"I'm giving a tour of the place." I gesture to Robin, who bows politely at the smith. "How's it looking?"

He flips open the notebook in his hand. "Well, the second shipment is a little behind and one of the supply lines was delayed, but the, uh, 'Assembly Line' project is coming along nicely otherwise."

"Assembly line?" Robin repeats.

Technically not an assembly line, since we're not that mechanically advanced nor do we have conveyor belts, but… "See all those guys down there?" I point out the window towards the workbenches below. "All of them are apprentice smiths."

"Uh huh…" Robin frowns and nods.

"Basically, the idea is to have a lot of small parts be produced by the junior smiths, and leave the harder or more artistic works to the masters…by doing this, we can cut down on production costs and ensure that the produced goods have an overall higher standard." In retrospect I should've called it the replacement part project.

_RPP instead of ALP._

Robin scratches her head. "That's great, but…why?"

I shrug. "Well, this way I can make more stuff with less money. There's a perk to the blacksmith guild too."

The smith nods. "With this, we can select the apprentices that actually demonstrate potential, instead of training one for years and have their sorry asses quit; less risk for us."

"And the best part is: word is already getting out about this training facility." I grin. "So we're getting a lot of applicants, and a lot of production and training is getting done."

Robin glances at me worriedly. "I'm still not sure exactly what you need this level of production for. Plegia is dead and Walhart is…well, an uncertainty."

"Well, if Walhart never comes around then we would have stolen the production basket from right underneath Plegia's noses." I shrug. "So as far as I'm concerned it's a win-win."

Robin glances out of the window again. "It doesn't seem like that much of a line right now though."

"Yeah." I sigh. "Getting the equipment together is oddly difficult, even with the guild's influence."

Still, we're getting there.

"So this is what you've been busy with, huh…" Robin murmurs, still staring out of the window at the people below.

"This, plus the docks, cost me just about all of my political leverage…well, all of the leverage I got via Basilio and Flavia's support, anyways."

"Khan Basilio and Great Khan Flavia." The smith corrects me under his breath.

_Not for the first time either._

Robin spins to stare at me. "Docks…you're making new ships?"

Eh… "Trying to; it's still a no-go for now since we can't find the people to do it."

I mean, I have the idea, but it's not the same as actually having the shipbuilding experience.

"Maybe we can ask Mustafa to send some people?" Robin says after a minute of thinking. "It would be good for both of you."

Hm. "Sounds like a good idea, but I'll need to prep for that."

"Prep? What do you need to prep for?!" Robin demands.

Uh…how can I say this and not get my ass fried? "War sucks."

Robin glares at me for a minute, before her eyes flicker to the smith. Then the understanding comes onto her face.

"That's true, but…seeing is believing, you know?" Robin says.

Seeing is…the hell?

_If we're worried about the Feroxi citizenry receiving the Plegian workers poorly, then we'll just have to show them that the Plegians are in fact not bloodthirsty or assholes._

Oh. Right.

"If you can make it work, then by all means go ahead." I shrug. "Master, we're gonna head out. Keep up the good work."

"Yeah, you too." The blacksmith master says distractedly, opening the window that Robin was looking out of.

_We plug our ears. Robin, ever quick on the uptake, does the same._

"OY! YOU OVER THERE! WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU DOING TO THOSE NAILS?!" He roars.

_Given the lack of a pronoun every apprentice stopped to check their nail work. Half of them realized that they weren't making nails. The other half fervently hoped that it wasn't their ass on the chopping block._

…

"Jeez, that guy can yell." Robin says, wincingly slightly even as we left the complex, with the blacksmith master's voice still in the air.

"Very good reason to make him the lead of the operation." I laugh. "What do you think?"

"It…" Robin stops to plan her words. "It feels like you're gearing up for a war, and I'm amazed that Ferox still has that spirit in them."

"They don't." I admit. "Which is why I'm prepping the economic game first." Work on the macro game first, after all.

"So that when the invasion actually happens, you'll be able to switch to wartime production very quickly?" Robin guesses.

I nod. "Again, even if Walhart doesn't show up, we'll get something out the plans, so it's not a total waste of time and effort…makes it a lot easier for other nobles to get behind."

"Speaking of the other nobles." Robin says suddenly, a weirdly creepy grin on her face. "Have you gotten any of these yet?" Robin holds up a letter for me to read.

Let's see…

…

…

The fuck?

_The letter is full of flowery poetry and horrific, almost pun-levels of rhyming. Had the writer not sign his name in huge-ass letters we would've guessed that Virion wrote this._

"Is this a love letter?" I hand it back to her.

"Complete with a gift I left at home." Robin laughs. "Most of us unwed Shepherds are getting these from the rest of the Ylissean nobility."

Oh really? Count me interested.

"Who's gotten the most so far?" I ask.

Robin giggles. "Interestingly enough, Nino. Cordelia comes close second though."

Wait, seriously?

"I know, right?!" Robin says upon seeing my face. "I really though Cordelia would be first too."

"Why Nino though?" I wonder. "I mean…"

She's a kid, as far as we're concerned.

"Probably because she's a genuinely nice person." Robin says.

"Sorry Cordelia." Nowi says in a sing-song voice.

Robin blushes. "Well, not saying that she isn't a nice person, but…Cordelia is very invested in Chrom and everyone knows it, so…" She trails off.

"Hard to court someone who's obviously in love with someone else, yeah." I nod.

"So…I guess you haven't gotten any." Robin says, crestfallen.

"Uh…I'm pretty sure every noble in this town and the surrounding ones hate my guts." I shrug. "Not worried."

"Because you have Nowi?" Robin teases.

"Yeah!" Nowi agrees happily.

"Because I'm working my ass off, no thanks to the freeloader." I pat Nowi on her head.

We walk a little bit more before Robin suddenly turns on me.

"So now that Nowi's here, what's going on with you and Cherche?" Robin asks. "I've seen her around the castle a lot and I'm pretty sure you asked her to do something else."

I nod. "Yeah, I did; unfortunately Wyverns are only native to Plegia around here, so we're thinking of other options for now…and since if she has nothing to train me with, she's better off helping the castle."

"Explains why she's practicing with the Pegasus Knights." Robin says to herself. "So…what, are you just giving her all the work?"

I laugh awkwardly. "More or less; she knows more about Wyverns than I do, and the resources at the castle are greater, so it's overall a better deal for her."

_Robin stares at us with a frown._

"What?" I'm a little defensive under her gaze.

"You're not much of a romantic, are you?"

I'm a what now? " 'scuse me?"

"Well, I just think it would be incredibly romantic to be living under one roof with your trusted friend and partner, and then slowly fall in love." She sighs.

Methinks you read too much. "Sounds like Virion and Cherche."

Robin glares at me.

…

…

[Night]

_Following dinner (delicious, delicious seafood) Robin decided to turn in early, owing to the next leg of her trip being pretty long and tiring, especially if Mustafa doesn't play along. He should play along, but she's just being careful._

_Anyways, after she's retired upstairs, Nowi and I go about handling the dishes. (Nina has enough to do as it is)._

Hmm… "You didn't tell Robin about your…uh, thing."

"She has a lot of things to do right now." Nowi says. "And I can handle my own stuff."

I'm sure. "The search would go a bit faster if she got involved, though."

"I can do it." Nowi pouts. "I've almost got it, too."

"Yeah, yeah." I pat Nowi on her head with my soapy wet hand.

Nowi responds by shaking her head quickly and scattering water everywhere.

_What will we do once Nowi locates her Dragonstone?_

We'll go in and forcibly occupy the property that it is housed in.

_With…what, our mediocre combat skills?_

Our mediocre combat skills plus the new gear we're prototyping. It's going to work out just fine.

.

.

.

{ === + === }

Part one of the "and things happened to people" arc.


	19. Interlude - 2

[More Summer, Castle Ylisstol]

A key difference of having Emmeryn alive: she still holds the responsibilities of maintaining and ruling a nation, which leaves Chrom with a lot of spare time when the Shepherds aren't on the move.

Thus, Chrom, on his now daily walks through the castle, strode past an open door with a cursory glance and then backpedaled upon seeing the contents of said room.

Feeling intrigued and just a little bit worried, he stepped into the room to observe the body sitting next to the table.

"You look like you melted onto the table." He said after a minute of silently watching and worrying.

"Uuuuugh." Robin groaned in response, her face plastered to the table she's sitting at.

"Are…are you ok?" Chrom asked worriedly when Robin didn't stir for another minute.

Robin lifts her head up from her table (complete with a sheet of paper stuck to her face). "Ylisse summers are horrible. So horrible."

"Where were you living until now, then?" Chrom fought back an urge to peel the paper from Robin's face, and didn't notice Robin freeze for a fraction of a second.

"Ferox." Robin said. "I've lived in Ferox ever since I was little; right now I'm seriously entertaining the idea of going back just for the summers."

"Really? I didn't see you as a Feroxi girl." Chrom muttered.

_Not like mother had much of a choice. _Robin thought idly. "What's that supposed to mean?"

"Nothing." Chrom said quickly. "What are you working on?"

Robin peeled the paper stuck to her face. "Draft for the formal trade agreement with what's-his-face." She snaps her fingers. "Mustafa."

Chrom frowns. "It doesn't seem likely that we'll be able to trade anything, given…well, the current situation."

The "current situation" being Plegia's descent into full-out civil war, and the banditry it spawned (primarily into Feroxi borders). To combat the rising tide of Plegian bandits, most Feroxi border towns adopted a "shoot first, identify later" policy with all caravans that suggest Plegian origin, leading to increased tensions and further banditry, but away from the main town centers.

Overall, not a good time to be Plegian or living on the Plegia/Ferox borders. Ylisse gets a free pass due to having more than enough air presence to patrol a mostly mountainous border (and having a smaller border to begin with).

Robin made a disgusted face. "Yeah…well, this is for political purposes, really."

Chrom walked over to the table. "It looks like there're two copies of the same thing."

"One of them is for Ash." Robin said.

Chrom blinks in surprise. "What?"

"Yeah…the man is oddly underhanded when it comes to politics." Robin said lightly.

Chrom was starting to feel a little apprehensive. "Care to explain?"

"Ash has already made a local trade deal with Mustafa." Robin says. "I'm not quite sure what the contents of the trade agreement is, but…well, there's a reason our nobles are suddenly very keen on making a deal with a Plegian offshoot of a nation on the other side of the continent."

"Hmm."

Chrom and Robin both jump in terror as they notice Fredrick standing behind Chrom.

"So Ash is somehow responsible for their change of heart?" Chrom said once his heart stopped racing.

Robin shrugs. "Honestly? I'm not too sure. Regardless of how good his Outrealm ideas are, I don't see him doing anything drastic within a month's time…that being said, I can't see anyone else having anywhere near as much impact as he can." She then stared at Fredrick. "What are you doing here?"

"A suggestion from the Exalt." Fredrick said, slightly smiling. "Send some Pegasus Knights to Ash."

Robin and Chrom stared blankly at Fredrick.

Fredrick's slight smile didn't change. "According to the rumors floating around court, Basilio and Flavia have been looking around for Pegasus knights they can spare to send to the western coast, for some specialized training."

Considering the Plegian Situation the few flyers in Ferox have been working a lot of overtime.

"Doesn't take a genius to figure out who's receiving those knights." Robin mutters, and then speaks normally. "I assume this is somehow related to Ash moving to Ferox to work in the first place."

"Most likely." Fredrick nods. "It is the Exalt's belief that whatever Ash is working on will be…immensely beneficial, in the years to come."

"She has a lot of faith in him, doesn't she?" Robin says, and then grins. "Maybe she has a thing for him."

"Considering how little time the two spent together I seriously doubt it." Fredrick mutters (a little smugly). "What do you think Ash is going to do with this?" He said with a light tap to the paper.

"Best guess?" Robin shrugs. "He's an Outrealmer, after all, and that makes him difficult to predict; given what we've seen him do though, it's pretty much a given that whatever it does isn't going to be small."

Fredrick's eyebrows go up. "You seem to have a lot of faith in him." The "as well" was left unsaid but was very clearly understood.

"I wouldn't call it faith." Robin shudders. "He did make a weapon that far outstripped everything we could've dreamed of, even if it's destroyed."

"Imagine how badly the war would've gone if fate placed him on Plegia's side instead." Fredrick said lightly.

Robin chuckled. "Does that mean we're bribing him with Pegasus Knights now?"

…

[Ylisse Village]

…

Three Risen (Fighter types) shambled around an abandoned piece of farmland while a young man in a pot-hat observed them from behind a low stone fence.

"Looks like the work ain't never done, ma." Donnel laughed.

"Donny, you can just leave 'em alone, they'll leave soon enough." His mother said gently; the fact that Donnel came home with a very obvious limp (that was eventually healed by a passing Maribelle) did nothing to assure her that her little boy was a certified badass nowadays.

"Can't do that, ma. They'll just go trash someone else's place if we let 'em." Donnel jumps up. "Alrighty, let's get 'er done!"

The three Risen snapped their heads around (one of them definitely breaking its neck in the process) as they heard the now 15 year old young man rush at them spear-first with a loud roar.

They raise their axes in response, one of them charging forward to meet Donnel and swings with his axe.

Donnel's response was to step in harder and give himself a little extra speed, running past the axe swing and its swinger entirely; instead, he used the speed and momentum behind the charge to run into one of the other Risens, his spearpoint lodged firmly where the core should be.

The risen vanishes in a puff of gooey purple smoke as one of the other Risens (the third one) raises his axe for an overhead strike.

Donnel's response is to sidestep the swing while using the shaft of his spear to hit the Risen's arm with such force that it snaps off entirely.

"You can have this back." Donnel grins as he deftly catches the Risen's falling axe by the handle and then lodges it into the Risen's body via a full-body turning swing.

The first Risen by now has re-charged towards Donnel, intent on taking his head off with another horizontal swing.

It never got its wish, as a large, red-eyed demonic rabbit slammed into the Risen from the side. The force propelled the Risen a good ten feet away as it landed beneath the boots of someone very large and smiley.

"Oh! Panne, thanks for gift!" Gregor laughed as he drove his sword into the Risen's center, killing it on the spot.

"Donnel, your enthusiasm has injured you in the past; do you not learn?" Panne asked as she reverted to her human form. "We told you to wait for us."

"Ah…well, there were just three of 'em." Donnel replied sheepishly.

Panne sighed. "You may be a master of traps, but it looks like your hunting sense still needs work."

Gregor laughed. "Ah…don't be hard on Donny. He help us yesterday, no?"

'Yesterday' being the swarm of nearly thirty Risen that Donnel had snagged one way or another in very simple but durable traps, allowing the trio to dispatch every last one with ease. Except for these three.

"Besides…" Gregor grinned. "Panne has nasty habit of charging forward too."

Panne's face flushed slightly. "Silence; I'm entirely aware of my limitations and act accordingly. You!" She said accusingly to Donnel

Donnel has his face turned away to hide his grin and didn't answer.

"I know you laugh. Cease at once!" Panne demanded.

Gregor patted Panne on her shoulder. "Now now." He quickly withdrew his hand when she glared at him.

"Pah." Panne huffs. "Regardless, our job here is complete; let us not tarry any longer." She heads toward the village.

Gregor and Donnel shared a knowing glance (and a slight grin) and followed after her.

…

After a short walk, the two of them arrived back at Donnel's village (Panne had already vanished to god knows where).

"Hey! Donnie!" A young man greeted cheerfully.

Donnel waved back just as cheerfully. "Oh! Daniel!"

The kid named Daniel (who's just as old as Donnel) walked up to the two of them. "It looks like those things didn't give you any trouble." He observed. "You're alive."

"Hey, it takes a lot more than just a handful of Risen to take us." Donnel grinned, tapping himself on the chest. "You're looking at a veteran of the Shepherds now!"

"Yeah, sure." Daniel laughed. "Seriously though…where's the lady that was with you?" He looked around.

"No clue. She goes wherever she wants." Donnel shrugs. "Why?"

Daniel shifts uncomfortably. "She seemed interesting."

Donnel nods. "Yeah, she's really cool, and…"

Gregor coughs. "Talk is fine, but we have to report job, no?"

Donnel jumps (Gregor has a bad habit of standing behind people) and nods furiously. "Right, right. Dan, I'll see you later."

"Yeah, sure thing; teach me a few moves when you're done, alright?" Daniel replied, noting with some worry that he somehow entirely missed the huge ginger-haired man.

"Friend of yours?" Gregor asked, looking around at the village once savaged by bandits.

"Best friend. I really thought he died back then." Donnel replied, waving back at his ex-neighbors of the village. "It's a real good feeling to come back and see everyone safe again."

_Mostly everyone. _He added to himself.

"It is always good to visit home." Gregor chuckled. "Sets the heart at ease, no?"

"Yeah." Donnel nodded and then suddenly stopped. "Did you know…?"

Gregor turned with a knowing grin plastered wide on his face. "I knew nothing; this job gave me a good feeling when I took it. Now come, we report job, get money, and spend rest of day off!"

…

[Ylisstol Pegasus Training Grounds]

…

As is usual for the summer, the Ylissean Pegasus Knights are hard at work training. Because training lets you fly, and flying is the best medicine against the muggy Ylissean heat.

Unfortunately for today, Cordelia the Fiery Demon was in charge. Nobody dared to call her a Genius or somehow Gifted (to her face), because it was quite obvious that Cordelia was driving herself harder than she was driving her recruits.

Not to say the recruits were happy about them getting a metric ton of training, mind you.

"What is wrong with Phila?!" One of the veteran knights moaned upon landing for water. "Why is the Demon doing the training today?"

"Can't keep up?" Her friend teased.

"She's…!" The complainy veteran made some infuriated hand gestures. "How in the high heavens are we supposed to keep up with her?!"

Her friend looked up into the sky, squinting against the bright sunlight.

She saw, to her amusement (and slight terror) Cordelia outflying a squad of five rookies, using their fear against them and gradually boxing in the five rookies closer to each other. _That's going to be a collision later. _"That's what training is for, right? We're supposed to learn from her."

"Well, yeah, but how can I learn when I get hit every minute?" Complainy complained.

"Maybe you should just fly faster." Her friend giggled, and then flinched as the sound of something heavy colliding with each other came from the sky. "Oh dear."

"Fly faster. Right. As if it's that easy." Complainy complained (more), ignoring the sound from the sky.

Her friend couldn't help but look up. "I don't see why not. It's not like Cordelia was born to be that good." She saw the ball of trainees and Pegasi drop precipitously before it untangled into its trainee components and said components righted themselves in the sky and avoided what would've otherwise been a horrific tragedy with the ground.

"Easy for you to say." Complainy huffs. "Little Miss Genius got way too cocky after coming back from her little trip with the Prince. Why isn't Phila handing out promotions to us? We fought tooth and nail to keep the skies over Ylisstol clear, after all."

"Because it wasn't just us?" Her friend replied. "I mean, if it weren't for Ferox we would've eventually lost the city." She thought back to how Ferox opted to attack and overwhelm the Plegian land forces in lieu of having the air power to push Plegia back.

Complainy huffed. "It was still mostly us. Aaah…I want a promotion. This sucks." She sighed.

"Sigh like that again and we'll think you have love issues." Her friend said snidely. Cordelia's love trouble is a well-known secret to the entirety of the Ylisstol populace.

"As if I don't." Complainy complained.

…

[Later]

…

"It feels like morale among the knights is pretty low." Phila observed.

"It is pretty low. I get the feeling some of them aren't too happy with me." Cordelia sighed.

"Well, if our air power during the war was better, they wouldn't be in this situation." Phila huffed.

Cordelia absentmindedly polished her armor (chest piece). "I'm pretty sure having me as an instructor contributes to their discontent, though…"

"That's not a problem." Phila has the smallest smirk playing on her face. "If they didn't acknowledge your abilities they wouldn't follow your instructions to begin with."

_Having most of the real veterans out of action didn't hurt. _Cordelia amended, and then chided herself for thinking that way.

"Ah, that's right." Phila took out a piece of paper. "We have a request from Robin." She held out the paper.

"What?" Cordelia takes the paper and scans it quickly. "Is she serious? Did the Exalt agree to this?"

Phila shrugs. "Knowing the Exalt, probably; since that man is for all intents and purposes a Feroxi Noble, assisting him certainly won't hurt."

Cordelia runs a hand through her hair. "Ah, geez…"

…

…

…

[1st Person Camera]

…

…

…Huh?

It's…really bright. Did I leave the light on again?

"Ninya?" I call out dazedly. No response. "Ah, geez. What the hell…"

_Waking up in 3…2…_

Look outside.

It's…

Ah, fuck.

Spring out of bed.

…

Get dressed.

"Ninya! Where are you?!" I yell as I charge towards her room.

_She lives in our house on the first floor._

Given by the lack of panic and stuff burning to the ground outside I daresay whatever massive invasion is going on hasn't actually happened yet, but eh.

_We barge into Nina's room and she sits up groggily._

"Master…what…" Nina's about as disoriented as I am Ok wow she sleeps nude. "Why is it so bright?"

_Interestingly enough our maid isn't a morning person. Breakfast is usually a little odd as a result._

"Get up, get dressed; we're under attack." Let's look away because it seems kind of rude to stare.

"Attack…the Risen?" She's aware enough to cover herself with the sheets now.

"Yeah." Shit, it just got even brighter. It feels like someone attached a floodlight to every window. It actually hurts my eyes now. "Look, go hide so I don't have to worry about you; no discussion. Go hide."

"Yes sir." She says meekly.

_We bolt downstairs, where we keep our equipment._

Ok, gear, gear…

Javelins, check.

Launcher, check.

Improved wind shoes, check.

Sword, check.

Type Three GN Blade, check…I've got spare ammo, too, even if it's still just nails.

Tower shield, check…I skimped on armor. Oh well.

It's going to have to do.

…

I burst out of my house's front door.

"Sir! The Risen are coming!" One of the town guards yell (with an entourage of spear-wielding guards).

"I can see that!" I snap. "Get to your positions! They will not set foot inside the town!"

"Yes sir!"

"Ash!" One of the nobles from the town (don't know who) stops short in front of me astride his horse.

"Do we have any fliers?" I shout over the rising din of guards getting to their positions.

"Me; it's good to see you again, Ash." A lady with pink hair and a dragon-like hair decoration said with a warm smile. Besides her stood a…well it's Minerva, so…

"Cherche! Awesome. I need you and Minerva in the sky double time; patrol the town and stick to the rooftops."

Cherche nods. "Understood." And then she takes off into the night.

"What of the citizenry?" The noble asked.

Oh come on man think for yourself. "What of it? Organize the ones who want to fight as mobile patrol; we need to take of any Risen that drops into the town. Ah! Fuck!" The light burns my eyes as the sky lights up again, signaling the first Risen descent from the sky. "We're out of time. Let those who want to fight fight, the rest stay in their homes. Move it!"

The noble nods and rides off and disappears around a corner, and we head toward the main entrance to the town.

The guards in the main entrance is organized into a line formation, but it doesn't feel like the Risen care enough to attack them, despite the massive amount of torches set up at the entrance.

_We can't rely on the Risen being attracted by fire when it's so consistently bright._

"Frontline! Make noise and let the Risen come to you!" I roar.

Obligingly, the town guards arranged at the town entrance makes a racket with their roars and banging their spears on their shields.

I can't see outside so I hope it's working as intended.

…Yep. Judging by the Risen's counter-groan it's probably working as intended.

"Alright, steady!" I yell. "Let them come to you!"

_By now we've actually arrived at the gate._

I paid for extra wall extensions to create a small killzone, adding a second gate attached to the wall extensions but most importantly letting us mount ladders onto the extension pieces to make things go faster (we don't really have a gatehouse and the majority of the wall is wood plus densely packed dirt, so…y'know)

_The front gate of the town now looks like a box if you look at it from the sky._

Either way.

_We rush up the ladder to get a better vantage point against the Risen._

And holy fucking Christ this is a lot of Risen. Welp.

"Supply teams! Bring up extra lances and arrows!" One of the captains on the walls yelled, before ducking to avoid a flurry of arrows his way. "Sir." He nods as I reach him.

"Holy shit, man." I breathe.

"I agree, sir." He grins. "It's a good night to be a Feroxi."

The first cluster of ok nevermind the Risen just dogpiled the soldiers at the gate, and we're talking about a Risen density so high it looks more like a Black Friday sale than a zombie apocalypse.

_The soldiers protecting the gate brace their lances on the ground to better absorb the impact and stop the Risen's charge by sheer force of will._

Pretty sure I heard a few lances snap during that attack too.

"Pour it on!" The captain yells, and the archers manning the kill zone light their arrows and rain it upon the zombie apocalypse. (The effectiveness of this attack is debatable)

I'm really glad we treated the walls to be fire resistant right now.

"The rest of you, take care of the Risens with range!" The captain yells, nocking his bow and firing it at a Risen in the distance. His men copy his actions and a handful of Archer Risen fall.

The million archer Risen army fires back in response.

We all go "Holy fucking shit" and duck for cover.

Our wall now has a massive eyelash made of arrows.

"I'm engaging, have the recovery system ready." I say tersely, and hop over the wall.

…

[3rd Person Camera]

…

While the towns on the continent experienced frequent Risen attacks (at least once per week) up until this moment, those attacks have all been light in severity, if wide in scope. The consistent but very small threat has led some nobles to classify the Risen as a minor threat in the grand scheme of things, on the same scale as your average bandit attack.

Yeah…no, that kind of thought isn't lasting through the night this time.

Several locations on the main continent (we're counting Valm as a sub-continent for description purposes) found themselves hit by attacks from Risen armies with headcounts equivalent to a small city, the town Ash is residing being one of the lighter hit ones.

Anyways.

Ash jumps down from the walls, assisted by his improved wind boots.

"Ok…" Ash breathed. "Let's get this started." He then loaded up a javelin into the launcher (a long hollow tube strapped to his left arm, braced against the tower shield), took aim at the Risen archers further from the walls, and fired.

As three of the Archers went down from that one Javelin (and Ash marveled at the relative lack of durability of this particular batch of Risen) about thirty more decided to take aim at Ash in retaliation.

"Yeah…I didn't think this one through." Ash muttered while coasting to the side on his wind shoes. "Oh well, let's do this one right."

He pulled out the very blocky looking GN Blade and focused magical power into the hilt, and the blade twisted ninety degrees on its base, with its edge glowing with a red.

With his blade in position, Ash adjusted his path to take him closer to the Risen. "Alright." He snarled. "Let's do this." A very out-of-place grin came onto his face…a grin that didn't seem to properly convey the danger of running headfirst into a throng of Risen archers. "Double O," Ash said through the grin, "Destroying targets!"

…

Meanwhile in the sky (very low over the rooftops), Minerva and Cherche were busy circling around directing small groups of reserve forces around the town streets, hunting down small groups of Risen that were dropped into the town.

"Five Risen, south of here, three streets down." Cherche said calmly and clearly.

"Got it, lady." The closest band of spear-toting guards said, hurrying towards the direction she pointed out.

Cherche then grimaced as another bright flash of light pierced the sky. "Looks like more of them." She muttered. She then pointed Minerva toward the sky and the two climbed up to meet the falling Risen.

For the falling Risen, especially those who were not Pegasus Knights…falling into Cherche's axe with their face is not good for their structural condition, and a few houses in the town received a shower of Risen bits onto their roofs as Cherche inverted to dive down toward the town surface again.

Her little jaunt in the skies didn't exactly go unnoticed.

"Uh oh." She grimaced as a flurry of wind magic zipped by her and Minerva and rolled to dodge. "Shouldn't have gotten so over-eager."

Cherche then notices a particularly vicious looking blast of Arcwind headed her wind, and reached into a pouch strapped to her waist. She pulls out a handful of glittery powder mixed with what looks like pebbles and tosses it in the general direction of the Arcwind.

The Arcwind impacts the glittery powder and explodes harmlessly in the sky as Cherche descends to an altitude that protected her from being targeted by the Risen mages outside the town. "Gentlemen," She says calmly to the group of guards frozen in surprise at her sudden descent. "There is a group of Risen two streets north of here, please deal with them."

The leader blinked away her surprise. "Uh, yeah, sure. We're on it." She said, leading her men onwards.

Cherche and Minerva pulled up again to the rooftops, and returned to their duties of advising the many small ground units scattered around the town.

…

Ash backpedaled with his wind shoes, escaping the reach of a Risen's dagger before charging in again with the oversized blade attached to his right fist. As expected, the Risen archer had no chance and dissolved into smoke with the thin but very blocky blade thrust into its stomach.

"I'm not strong enough to make neat cuts with this thing, am I." Ash sighed, skating left and right on the wind to avoid the wrath of the archer's 150 friends. "Maybe I should add rocket boosters to this thing too." He mused and stopped channeling magic into the sword. The top half of the blade snapped back into its original position, revealing a pair of holes within the blocky blade.

Ash focused again, and a pair of nails shot out from the holes within the blocky blade, impacting and destroying the nearest Risen. "I guess using a traditional sword is just better." He grumbled, switching the blade into its cutting mode again.

He then hid behind the tower shield against the next barrage of arrows. "Yep, definitely better. Fuck this idea." Ash kicked his wind shoes into high gear, backpedaling away and dodging erratically against the incoming fire while sheathing the GN Blade in favor of the normal sword. "SCIENCE!" He roars, shifting power and charging forward again.

…

…

"What in the hells happened to you?" The captain on the walls asked about fifteen minutes later.

Ash hopped over the wall, letting go of the rope responsible for pulling him up. "I may have overestimated how good my shield was."

Which was true; the tower shield had so many arrows in it that if the arrows were pulled out and returned to their components it was enough materials to make a new tower shield. A few arrows had actually pierced the shield and were responsible for fixing the shield onto Ash's arm.

"So how does it look?" Ash asked, inwardly glad that the archers didn't use bodkin arrows that would've hurt immensely and made the pulling out of said arrows in order to remove the shield a royal bitch. "Also, got a potion I can use?"

The captain tosses Ash a Vulnerary. "We're switching out people as necessary, and we have plenty of lances to keep them at bay…not too sure on how the other entrances are doing though."

Ash downed the entire Vulnerary in one go. "That means the other gates are going to go down any second now." He grumbles, and then addresses the captain. "Run some lights on the walls. Make them come to the main entrance." The glowing eyes of doom have largely dissipated now, and the majority of the lights come from the torches on the walls and the spells the Risen mages were slinging at said walls (to no real effect).

The captain peered at the western entrance, with its barricaded thick wooden doors. "You got it…where are you going?" He asked as Ash hopped off of the wall into the town.

"I need a resupply." Ash said quickly.

…

[1st Person Camera]

…

Well, not every idea is as good when you put it into practice…a bit of a shame to lose the Double-O Blade to bad design. Now where did I leave my crossbow?

Oof.

_A warm something jumped at us as soon as we entered our armory (basement in house)._

"You're back!" Nina exclaims happily as she has my neck in a very warm hug.

"Yes, yes…you didn't go hide." I pet her head.

"I didn't want to; it's safer here anyways." She says coyly.

Sigh. I might need to hire a new maid if she's getting too attached.

_On the other hand as far as we're concerned she's effectively family._

Yeah. She's also a compulsory hugger and that's hardly bad. "Wonderful, now stay put…and let go."

_She doesn't let go._

"Let me go with you." She mumbles into my ear.

_Near our ear; there's a small height difference she isn't overcoming._

"I don't like waiting. Let me fight." She says, a bit less…arousingly? This time.

_There's a single torch giving light into this basement, in case anyone's wondering about how everything looks._

Yeah, yeah. My basement is a mess with a lot of equipment lying everywhere, etcetera, etcetera…

"Are you sure?" I ask, prying her from my neck so I can get a look at her face.

She nods, her eyes determined.

Let's be honest…there's a zombie siege and I'm not in the mood to debate the point anyways. "Ok, get that armor on" I gesture to the suits of leather armor stashed in the corner "and take a crossbow."

She practically hops with happiness. "Yes!"

_I'm afraid we might have created a murder-Lute now._

An archer Lute.

…

The two of us ascend from the basement a few minutes later. Nina's armed with a crossbow, arrows (not bolts, because I don't have any) a spear, and a dagger.

_And a buckler; if she actually _has_ to use the buckler we're fucked, but it gives us a peace of mind._

I have my sword, a new tower shield, armor (finally), and an extra normal sword, and our javelins.

The spear launcher broke (due to arrow perforation), which is sad.

_But it did take like fifteen arrow hits so it went out like an inanimate champ._

…

_We head down the street towards the main entrance a bit slower than before, since Nina isn't as used to moving with combat equipment._

And then we run straight into a few Risen shambling down the street.

_Revenant types, total count: six. However, they don't seem to have noticed us._

Small blessings. "Take them out." I say quietly and pull out the crossbow, Nina mimicking my movements. "On three…two…one…"

With two quiet _thwup _noises two of the Risen suffer a critical existence failure and the rest turn around in surprise.

_If vapor zombies could have emotion, it would be surprise._

"I'm counting on your aim, Ninya." I say and draw my sword.

Nina has already reloaded. "Yep!" She fires and it nicks a Risen, knocking him off balance.

_Judging by how quickly she reloaded she might have been practicing with them behind our backs._

"Nice." I throw a javelin at the Risen and kill it. Yay Kill stealing!

The rest of the Risen run at us.

But I can use magic.

_With a blast of wind magic we knock all of the Risen off balance._

Sword time!

…

"I've never seen you fight, master." Nina says (with some level of surprise) after the other risen were systematically dispatched. "It looks like your reputation of a veteran wasn't a joke after all."

I glance at her. "What, you didn't believe me?"

Her smile looks just a tad sheepish. "Well…your behavior was never like the other Noble soldiers from the war, so…"

_In other words we're a weirdo._

"Ah! It's not like I disliked your behavior!" Nina rapidly backpedals. "It's just that—"

I shake my head. "Yeah, yeah…stay focused right now, yeah? We have a war to fight." I also grin at her to tell her she isn't actually in any kind of trouble.

"Uh," she salutes. "Yes sir!"

…

[3 hours later, in the early morning]

…

With the Risen attack more or less repelled, the guards are finally disbanded to the skeleton crew that normally keeps watch during the night so everyone else could go sleep.

"In Naga's name we have achieved victory." One of the guard captains breathed, looking at the kill zone filled with Risen corpses in various stages of…poof…ness.

_Apparently this batch dies fast but their bodies don't vanish nearly as quickly._

"But by god that was the worst fucking thing I've ever seen." He finishes, and takes a swig of whatever's in that flask of his…probably alcohol.

I'm actually worried, because judging by the numbers of Risen that showed up we sure as hell didn't kill ALL of them.

_There are still sporadic clumps of Risen that shows up at the walls from time to time but nothing the graveyard shift crew can't handle._

"Cherche." I shift the weight of the sleepy Ninya on my arm (we're sitting in the town square, just anywhere on the ground).

She gives Minerva's head a soft pat, and the Wyvern lies down to rest for a bit. "Yes, Ash?"

"Did you see if any Risen ran away? I feel like the fight should've lasted a lot longer than it did."

Cherche nods. "A mass of them ran north…a very sizeable mass."

North, huh…

What's north of us?

"Do you have an idea of where they might be going?" Cherche asks, stifling a yawn like a lady.

Hmm… "I don't really know." As far as I'm aware there's nothing interesting north of us.

_Morgan._

Morgan shouldn't be here…at least until Robin gets married anyways, and I'm pretty sure I'd know about it when it happens.

…

That being said, it's not like I can just let them rampage around Ferox just because they're not related to my goals, can I…

Hmm.

Oh well, one thing at a time. "Do you have a place to sleep for the night?" I ask Cherche, even though it's going to stop being night really soon.

"Hm? Ah…well." She…doesn't?

"Well, come to my house then…also help me carry her." I pat Nina on her head.

…

Cherche sits down on my epic sofa, after we've carried Nina to her bed. "I didn't think you'd levy your own maid into battle."

_That's a bit of a lie: Nina walked herself to her bed after waking up about a quarter of the way to our house. We just helped guide her there._

I shrug. "She volunteered, and if we weren't being attacked by a massive army of undead in the middle of the night, I would've disagreed."

Cherche sighs and sinks into the sofa a bit further. "What HAPPENED tonight?"

Your guess is as good as mine. "Let's hope it doesn't happen again…otherwise the whole thing with Valm is going to get incredibly complicated…speaking of Valm," I snap my finger. "Why are you here?"

Cherche giggles sleepily. "I've found the wyverns, of course…and they're all such pretty things, too."

…

[Afternoon]

…

_We didn't get a whole lot of sleep; morning came and we got drafted to help organize the town's repair efforts. While the town itself isn't damaged (Cherche saw to that) the surrounding farms and countryside were less lucky._

To add on to that: Risen still linger around the farms just to be dicks, and we have to kill them because they just wouldn't leave.

_Trespassers will be shot, stabbed, and otherwise mutilated. Survivors will be prosecuted._

"Sir Ash."

Anways, we were having a small break back at our house until someone came up to our door, and Ninya let him in.

Turn around…there is someone in leather armor…looks like a scout?

I have no idea who he is though. "Hello, uh…"

He salutes. "I'm a scout in service to the local militia; the guard captain said I should talk to you about the Risen's movements."

That's nice of them. "Alright, let's hear it." I close the spell book I'm working on.

He salutes again. "Sir; the Risen army has headed north, and they've destroyed everything in their way."

That…uh, sucks. Like…really, really hard.

_Nina and Cherche, who were listening in, very obviously tensed at the news. It might be a good idea to avoid doing our work in the living room._

It would be kind of rude to Cherche though. "Go on."

"Yes sir; at last check they seemed to be converging on one position…sir?"

_Our forehead has just met our table._

Son of a bitch. "Let me guess…the position is a temple to Naga."

He blinks in surprise. "Yes, it is…how did you…"

"Call it a hunch." Super shit. This means whoever was responsible for that Risen Army considers Morgan a dangerous enough target to kill him with like a million zombies.

_Funnily enough a Morgan with the right skills could kill an infinite amount of zombies and still be perfectly ok…Armthrift, Vantage, Ignis, Vengeance, Astra, and a Nosferatu tome (with appropriate class)._

Yeah, well…reality speaks here, and we run the risk of getting Morgan killed by doing nothing.

Why is Morgan HERE already anyways? The first year isn't even half done right now…

Fuck it. We can work it out later. "Scout."

_He salutes again. _"Yes sir?"

"I need to find your guard captain."

…

…

[The Longfort, 3 Days later; 3rd Person Camera]

…

Khan Basilio stared at the entrance to the Longfort with a scowl on his face.

"It's been three days, why are their corpses not vanishing?" He muttered to himself while beheading the nearest Risen corpse with his axe.

"Maybe the cold has something to do with it." Flavia nudged the now-headless corpse over the wall.

Basilio grunted. "Cold. Right." Feroxi weather at this time of the year is fairly mild, even by the Longfort's standards; as such, the ground was a lush green with spots of wild flowers mixed in. "The Risen from before never stayed around this long. Should we be worried?"

"With numbers like this? Probably not." Flavia glanced toward the blanket of Risen corpses beneath the Longfort's walls. "But I am worried about something else." She then noticed the flag of Ylisstol in the distance.

…

"Looks like you guys got hit pretty hard too." Chrom said after the initial greetings with the two Khans were complete.

"So it wasn't just us? Damn." Basilio scowled, his axe resting against the Longfort wall. "How's Ylisstol?"

"Oh, Ylisstol is fine." Robin said. "The Risen showed up in a town in the Southwestern edges, and we took them out with the two mercenary companies housed in that area…I don't know why they attacked that place though." She scratches her nose. "Actually…a lot of Risen showed up to hit that town."

"A lot of Risen showed up to hit here, too." Flavia said. "But a majority of them headed west before the sun came up."

"Hmm." Chrom squinted towards the western horizon, as if trying to see what the Risen were headed toward. "What's toward the west?"

"Nothing of importance, that's what." Basilio huffed. "As far as my scouts told me the Risen are really interested in some large, abandoned mansion. Naga knows why."

Robin adopted her thinking pose. "Abandoned mansion, huh…Chrom?"

"Hm?"

"Do you think we can visit that mansion before we go back?"

Chrom raises an eyebrow. "Do you think there's something important there?"

Robin shrugs. "No idea, but if the Risen are interested in something, then it's worth looking into."

Basilio chuckles. "Well said, Robin." He hoists his axe over his shoulder. "When do we leave?"

"What do you mean, 'we'?" Robin demands.

"Well," Basilio points to his axe in an 'it should be obvious' kind of way. "I'm not letting an army of Risen alone when they're running around in my country and interfering with the lives of my citizens."

"Oh god dammit." Robin sighs. "I forgot you were a Chrom-type."

"I'll take that as a complement." Chrom grins.

…

The group enters the Longfort proper, in order for Basilio to make the arrangements necessary for the journey. Flavia took her leave at this point, in order to see to more of the defense of Ferox than just the immediate future.

"Sir Chrom, Lady Robin, it's good to see you two again." Olivia stands and bows as they met in a large meeting room next to an unlit fireplace.

"No need to be so formal; how've you been, Olivia?" Robin asks. "And how's Lon'qu?" She adds in a teasing undertone.

Olivia blushes slightly. "I'm doing very well, thank you very much…Lon'qu too."

Lon'qu, with his back against a wall and his arms crossed over his chest, simply nods in response.

"Aww." Robin says, dejected. "Well, I'm sure there's plenty of time in the future."

"You said it." Basilio laughs. "I've been giving them less work so they'd hook up more often, too…but no, it's just not going fast enough!"

"Khan Basilio!" Olivia pouts, very red in the face.

Basilio, being Basilio, simply laughs his ass off in response.

Olivia, still red in the face, desperately looks for a different subject matter. "Where's Lissa? Isn't she usually with you?" She asks.

"Lissa's on a trip with Nino." Robin snaps her fingers. "Right, almost forgot; Nino says that these Risen seemed very familiar to her."

Basilio has never met Nino. "Who's Nino again? One of your Shepherds?"

Chrom nods. "She assisted us in the war against Plegia; while she's not officially a Shepherd she can join up any time she wishes."

"The girl with the green short hair." Robin reminds Basilio.

Basilio's face changes from confusion to understanding. "Oh, that girl…familiar to her? Unlike the other Risen that she's never seen before since last week?"

"Well…" Robin adopts her thinking pose again. "She wouldn't explain it very clearly, and I'm sure it's because she's not entirely sure either, but it seems as if the Risen this time contained magical energies or properties that she has been exposed to for a very long amount of time."

"Given that the Risen appeared not a year ago…" Lon'qu scowls. "And where is she now?"

Robin grins. "She's with Lissa; they're on a trip to see Ash." The grin is just a little bit mischievous.

"Are they just heading over to see him just because he's an outsider?" Basilio grumbles. "Seems like a hell of a wild guess."

"Ha!" Robin laughs then holds her hand out to Chrom, who sulkily hands over a small bag. "That's exactly Lissa's basis for visiting him."

"And you let her?" Basilio's look of surprise was evident. "I didn't think you'd let the two of them go alone, all things considered."

"Lissa is…remarkably able with a hammer nowadays." Chrom smiles proudly. "Between the two of them any Risen that crosses their path will be sorry…then dead."

"Almost makes me wonder if Lissa went to see Ash just to have him make a toy for her." Robin mutters to herself.

…

[Roughly a week later]

…

Lissa and Nino arrives at the town Ash resides in, and are pleasantly surprised at how…loud, it is. With a little bit of help, they were able to locate Ash's house in the town.

Lissa knocks on the door.

A maid with pretty purple hair answers. "Yes? Can I help you?"

"Uh…this is Ash's house, right?" Lissa asks, unsure if the maid was just a maid or a girl dressed according to Ash's peculiarities.

Cordelia has weird tastes in books, as Lissa found out one day in one her many trips into people's rooms.

"Yes…I'm his maid, Nina." Nina bows. "Sir Ash isn't home right now. Is there some business you need him for?"

"Er…" Lissa didn't expect Ash to have a maid, and thus the gears in her head didn't quite switch fast enough. "It's not really urgent, but as fellow Shepherds I think it would be nice if he knew about…what we're going to tell him; I'm Lissa, by the way, and this is Nino."

Nino waves.

Nina bows…and a small bright-haired something runs into Lissa's stomach.

"Lissa! It's been so long!" Nowi happily yells mid-tackle.

"Nowi! What are you doing here?" Lissa responds equally loudly and happily, before her imagination goes off on some wild tangents.

"I live here!" She says, and Lissa goes red at the implications. Nowi, as occupied as she is trying to break all of Lissa's ribs with one hug, didn't notice.

"As Sir Ash would say," Nina interjects as she did notice Lissa's mental nosedive into the proverbial gutter. "Lady Nowi is a freeloader and should learn to stay in her room during the night."

As expected, the last bit didn't really help. Nino caught the implication by now as well, and her face is bright red due to her own imaginations.

"That's not what he said!" Nowi pouts, letting go of Lissa and turning to face Nina.

_We now vaguely regret having three people with names that start with N in one scene, with two names differing by only one letter._

"No, I added that last bit." Nina says regally. "Stop sneaking into Ash's room…or Cherche's, for that matter."

Lissa's mind has now entered maximum overload. "He lives with all three of you?!" She asks, a little shakily.

"Yes." Nina confirms with absolute indifference. "I would advise you to stop reading trashy romance novels in the future, Lady Lissa."

Nino had to grin and turn away for that one.

Lissa stammered something about not having any trashy romance novels to read, but the red-ness of her face didn't help her cover story one iota of a bit.

Nina sighs. "In any event…were my master here, he would invite you all into the house. So please come in and make yourselves at home until he returns."

…

…

[1st Person Camera]

…

…

"You're definitely getting better…and much faster than I imagined." Cherche says, handing me a waterskin.

"Yeah, well...it's because Mag is super smart."

Magna, my new Wyvern partner, growls in acknowledgement.

"He is quite a charming boy, isn't he?" Cherche coos, petting Magna's horns. "I'm amazed the two of you took to each other so quickly; maybe you just have a gift with Wyverns." She smiles at me.

"Or maybe Mag's just the friendliest Wyvern ever." I grin and toss Magna a fish, which he bumps with his nose (sending it flying straight up) before catching it in his open mouth and swallowing it whole.

His mouth still scare me, I have to admit. It's like a massive "do not put your hand here" tool that actively goes for your hands.

"Well, since you are progressing this quickly we can proceed to more advanced training by next week…provided that you have the time, that is." Cherche says.

_Minerva walks over to Magna and the two have a little wyvern-conversation…which feels a bit cat-ish as it involves a lot of body language (namely with the tail) and very little actual sound being made._

"If we both have the time, you mean; how's the status with the other Wyverns?" I ask.

Cherche smiles. "Very well! The colony is more than happy to lend us a few Wyverns, so long as we have the humans capable of befriending them."

Every time she uses the word 'befriending' in conjunction with Wyverns I get an uncomfortable chill in my stomach. "Awesome; it's nice to know that something's going right around here, at least."

Cherche has that sympathetic look in her eyes again. "Don't shoulder a burden you don't deserve…it's not going to make anyone else happier."

Yeah, yeah. Heard it before. "Right, right…I'm going back early today. I have a little bit of work I need to do."

Cherche bows. "Of course…travel safe."

_She sounds just a little bit sad._

"Hey! Magna!" I wave to my Wyvern, who swishes his tail in response. "I'll see you tomorrow; be good!"

_He grunts._

…

…

I don't remember my house being this rowdy before.

I mean, yeah, Nowi came back from god knows where, but…

Well, might as well see what's going on. "Nina, do we have guests?" I ask as I enter my own house.

"Yes you do!" A girl in a vibrant yellow dress and is obviously Lissa demands, turning to meet me eye to eye while still sitting on my epic sofa. "Why do you share a house with three women?!" She demands.

…did she get into Cordelia's porn stash?

_Pretty sure she'll kill you for phrasing it like that._

"Well…Nowi's a freeloader, Cherche needs a place to stay while she teaches me how to fly, and Nina keeps me alive." I tick off my fingers for each lady. "Also, hello Nino."

Nino waves back, still talking with Nowi.

"That's…those are not good enough reasons!" Lissa demands.

"Yes they are." I roll my eyes. "Now what brings the two of you across the continent? It's kind of unsafe to travel alone right now."

"Don't change the subject!" Lissa demands, but Nino has already hijacked the conversation.

"These new Risen are weird." Nino begins.

"Yeah, no shit." I mutter. Wait. "So they've been appearing everywhere?"

If they have, then we need to move fast every time these Risen shows up.

_You'll be overdoing it…and not all that well, either._

Don't care.

"Yes; a village southwest of Ylisstol was attacked around a week ago." Nino nods.

Southwest…how far? I think the map where you get Yarne is the only village in that direction within Ylissean territory though…the rest are too small to show up on maps.

"Well, fuck." I sigh. "Ok, so, why do you think these Risen are weird?"

_We plop down onto our epic sofa next to Lissa, who shifts away from us. Nina gets up to get us some tea from the kitchen._

"Uh…that is…I don't really know." Nino admits. "But they…um…"

C'mon girly spit it out

"They remind me of my mother." Nino finishes very, very quietly.

…Ok? I don't see how that's important.

"Really?" Nowi cocks her head. "Your mom is really weird then."

"Yeah…they're like, super creepy…what kind of family do you have?" Lissa asks jokingly.

Only the Black…Fang.

Uh…which mother is she talking about?

"The mother that raised you or…"

Nino looks surprised that we would make this distinction. "Yes…?"

_Of course she would be surprised; if she came to us before Chapter 26x she would never learn about her past…and thus she knows exactly one mother._

Good point. I don't quite remember when she got plucked out of her timeline.

Either way though, if these Risen remind her of Sonia we have a serious issue on our hands.

_In that case, who sent the Risen?_

"Um…Ash?" _Nino's tone is unsure, as we have utterly ignored her to go into our own little world._

"That's interesting…and makes me worried about your family history." I fake a grin.

"Meanie." Nino pouts.

We'll need to get started on the Legion Project really, really quickly now.

Maybe I should write another letter to Basilio.

.

.

.

{ === + === }

Author notes:

And the slow ride continues!


	20. Interlude - 2x: Morgan

**As the title implies this chapter is all about the paralogue where you get Morgan.**

The messenger leads me to the town watch barracks. "In here, sir." He says, unsure of exactly why I came out here to begin with.

"Sir Ash, welcome." The Guard Captain said with a smile (the same captain responsible for holding the walls from last night). "To what do I owe this pleasant surprise?"

Right down to business time. "I heard your scouts have a read on the Risen's movements."

He nods, looking grim again. "Yeah; it looks like they're all focused on an abandoned temple to Naga to the north of here; it's about a day's walk."

It seems kind of weird for a temple to just be abandoned like that.

"I know, I know." He holds up a hand, having read my frown. "Truth is, the temple restoration project was funded by one of the local lords, but after a fairly nasty business with a bandit attack he withdrew his support…thus, we have a half-done temple." He grimaces. "I have to admit I don't really know why the Risen are targeting the temple, but I assume it's nothing good."

…I guess I don't have much of an option but to bite the bullet, huh. "Do you have any men you can spare?"

He looks at me in surprise. "You intend to go after them?"

I nod. "Yeah. Whatever's in that temple, they want, and that means it's good for us."

He nods slowly. "That may be true. However, we are talking about a Risen army of incredible numbers. Even if they are weak individually…quantity has a quality of its own, and even if I gave you the entire city garrison it wouldn't be enough."

Thought as much. "Damn, so much for that."

_We turn to leave._

"You plan to go regardless, don't you?" He sighs.

"Of course." I say before I leave the barracks.

…

In the end, I don't know if it's actually Morgan in there, but the locations seem to match.

That being said, I'm not awesome enough to tackle an entire army and win. Hmm…

…

Regardless, if I'm right (and god I hope I'm dead wrong about this) then we're going to have a dead Morgan on our hands if we don't move fast.

Fuck it, let's do it.

_We don't need to wipe all of them. Just enough to go in and get Morgan out._

…

[Back home]

…

"Ash?"

_We didn't see who called our name in our haste towards our basement armory._

"What are you doing?" Nina asks.

"Getting ready." Let's see…wind boots are here, take normal swords because the prototypes are shit…

Nina follows us into the basement armory. "Getting ready for what?"

"Getting ready to do something incredibly stupid and amazing at the same time." Oh how I wish I still had my rocket propelled chain sword. I need to look into re-making that. Crossbow, spare spell books, especially the Circle of Wind books…

_Fires a circle of wind magic at shin level. The wind itself isn't sharp enough to cut but the force and position involved is enough to stagger your average infantry. This spell book is also making us a fair amount of cash with Ferox Bar Owners, since it's a very good way to get rid of the patrons who are just a tad too sloshed._

Money makes the world go around. Spare bolts for the crossbow…I have enough for like two hundred kills, which is like a drop in the bucket as far as this operation is concerned.

"Are…are you going alone?" Nina sounds worried.

"I hoped not, but time is of the essence and I don't have any options right now." Ok, ready.

Truth be told I wasn't ready for ANY of the future kids to show up until at least next year, so I'm a little blindsided.

"Watch the house." I say to Nina and rush up the stairs and out the door.

…

Let's see…North is…that-a-way.

_We ignore the townsfolk showering us with praise for holding off the undead menace in the middle of the night and skate northwards on our wind shoes._

We're already a day behind. In-game you arrive EXACTLY as Morgan comes under attack. Now…we're like a million turns late to the party, and I'm pretty sure that NPC Morgan, no matter how good his skills are, can't stand up to the Zerg rush of infinity Risen.

…

[An hour later]

…

After coming out and getting a good look around…Jesus these Risen are thorough.

The area immediately around the town was a little bit devastated, and I chalked it up to just collateral damage due to the fighting, but…wow, it's really bad up here. It feels as if every inch of farmland I can see (and it's a clear afternoon so I can see pretty damn far) has been burned to the ground.

_I don't think the Risen are responsible for this? I mean, using fire on shit seems like a very human thing to do._

True…magic fire doesn't burn either. I'm not quite sure what's going on. Either way though? Every farmland is burned, and I can see plumes of smoke in every direction. This is bad with a capital B. It's Bad. Bad Sad Bad.

_Far to our right there is a cluster of smoke plumes..._

That's…probably a dead village.

I don't feel like dropping by right now.

…

Even the roadside inns, the checkpoints for travelers going long distances, have been stripped to the ground.

This is starting to feel less and less like a Risen attack.

_We've been alternating between walking and wind-shoes-using for the duration of the travel, in order to avoid burning the shoes to the ground as well._

This…this is the apocalypse. Is this what the future kids saw every day? Like…I can't really describe how _dead _everything feels around here. I mean, normally you have a farm and even if there're no animals present, you can kind of, I don't know, _feel _the energy of the place, and even if it's quiet it's a nice, peaceful kind of quiet.

Right now though? It feels like…like the moment right before a door opens in a horror movie, except its constant, and it's making my nerves hurt.

_To recap, we can see around us for literally miles; northern Ferox, at least around these parts, aren't especially hilly. We see zero Risen, zero humans, zero animals, zero _anything_._

There are no enemies in sight and it feels like I'm going to get stabbed in the back at any second.

…

_The hair on our neck just stood up._

Draw sword, activate jet boots, about turn!

"Easy!" Cherche says, hovering well out of my reach. "I heard you had left north in chase of the Risen." She adds.

I sigh…not realizing just how badly my nerves were wound up until just now. "Yeah; want to give me a lift?"

"You…" she sighs, then lands. "I could just take you home right now." She points out as I climb to sit behind her.

"Yeah, I suppose." I sigh, already on Minerva's back. I give her a friendly pat on the back (not like I can reach anywhere else).

Cherche laughs a little, and then takes off, heading north again.

…

[Dusk]

…

Looks like it's gonna be a night operation. Fuck.

"Looks like we found the right place." Cherche mutters, circling above a pretty substantial ruin.

"Judging by the fact that the ground is moving, I'd say so." I shudder.

_The ground is just a blanket of Risen. For a brief moment, we entertain the thought of surfing on the ocean of undead bodies._

"What's your plan of attack, Ash?" Cherche asks.

…I gotta tell ya. It's one thing to see a fucking ocean of Risen. It's another thing for them to be ENTIRELY SILENT. At least moan or something!

"Ash?"

Oh, Cherche was talking to me. "Yeah?"

"Plan of attack?" She asks gently.

I don't have one. "Let's put down somewhere first; that mass is giving me the creeps."

"Look to your right." Cherche says, directing my eyes toward what looks like a campfire. "Maybe we can enlist for some help there."

Considering the circumstances? "Yeah, let's go."

…

Minerva swoops over the fire just so we're sure that it's actually a campsite and not, say, a tree burning.

It is a campsite, and the fact that we didn't get shot at is very reassuring.

…

_We land._

This? Not so reassuring.

_Immediately after we landed, and immediately after Cherche saw who stood up to meet us, she unhooked an axe from her hip belt and pointed it threateningly at said dangerous individual._

"Whoa, whoa, easy there, Cherche." Male!Robin says, as the Pegasus Knight lady he's with pulls out a spell book.

Cherche's axe is still pointed at him. "What are you doing here?" She demands.

_If you bought the DLCs like we did, then you'd know that Morgan shows up on the Future Past missions as a boss…because Morgan (doesn't matter which) is extremely devoted to Robin (doesn't matter which) and is very easy to push over the edge into fanatical evil-ness._

"Not to do anything evil, I assure you." Male!Robin smiles. "Well, then again, good and evil are very subjective concepts."

His smile is so far from reassuring when he's on the opposing side, it's kind of creepy.

_On the plus side he hasn't drawn his sword._

"Put your weapon away, Lady Cherche, or I will force you to do so." The lady Pegasus knight growls.

I glance at her. "Girlfriend?"

"Fiancée." Male!Robin grins as the bride-to-be drops her guard just a tiny bit.

"How…" Cherche starts to ask.

I interrupt her. "Cherche, it's alright…I think." I then turn to Male!Robin. "I suppose you're here for what's inside the temple?"

"You got it."Male!Robin grins. "I wish I could've gotten here faster, but gating takes a lot outta you, y'know?"

Ga-he knows how to teleport?

_He's also dangerously genre savvy, so he might be lying to keep us off balance; besides, I don't think he needs a Pegasus knight to come with him if he could teleport._

Let's pretend that he knows how to teleport then, because it's too dangerous to assume that he cannot.

"It seems a little strange for someone from Plegia to come so deep into Feroxi territory." Cherche remarks.

"That's what she said." Male!Robin mutters, the continues on in a normal tone. "As you might imagine, I'm here for something that the Risen is trying to get their hands on. Enemy of my enemy?"

_He holds out a hand._

"Ash." Cherche warns.

On one hand…dude is seriously fucking insane and I don't trust him at all.

On the other…we need to get Morgan out of that death pit. Assuming Morgan is in there to begin with.

_All signs point to yes._

I might regret this later, but for now…

_We shake his hand._

"Excellent!" Male!Robin grins, patting me on the back (the man-hug, if you will). "I never told you my name, did I? It's Hawk."

…well that's easier than calling him "Male Robin."

"Well then, Hawk." Cherche says, still full of doubt like your average sane person. "Can you care to enlighten us on why you tried to kill us?"

"I'm a man of _action, _Cherche." Hawk says, emphasizing 'action' with a little bit of jazz hands. "And as far as I knew back then you" he points to me "were a serious threat. Of course I know now that you're a capitalist at heart and not very useful, though."

…I can't tell if I'm being insulted.

"And how do you know my name?" Cherche demands.

"I can put two and two together." Hawk says, evading the question. "More importantly! We need to go and do our thing."

So…is he not out to kill us now? Is he playing up the insanity to get me to lower my guard?

_Paranoia later, save Morgan now. It's probably a bad idea to say this, but if Hawk wants to kill us there would be nothing we can do about it even if were fully prepared right now._

That…sucks. It's true, but it still sucks.

"Yeah, let's." I nod.

…

"Alright, here's the plan." Hawk says dramatically. "We fly in through the main entrance and blow it up from the inside so we can't be followed; the temple has several breaches in the roof, so we'll get in, get what we're looking for, and then get out."

"Sounds…deceptively simple." I frown. "What's the catch?"

"We have nothing we can use to cause the necessary door-blocking explosion." Hawk grins. "Sucks, right?"

He is way too fucking happy about all of this.

"In that case that's no longer a plan." Cherche points out.

Hawk nods sheepishly. "Yeah, yeah, I'd say so. So let's go with plan B."

I sigh, because I know exactly what he expects me to do. "So what's plan B?"

He grins wide as all hell. "We shoot all the motherfuckers between us and the money!"

I…you know what? I'm not even gonna ask. Apparently we knew each other really well from the future if he's quoting Saints Row 2.

"That is the worst plan." I make a face.

"It is the bestest plan." Hawk laughs. "Alright! Let's rock this joint!"

He fires three simultaneous Thorons in a fan, roasting at least a few hundred Risen in one go.

"Alice! Don't forget me!" Hawk laughs, as his Pegasus knight mounts up. "Don't mess up on your timing, Ash!" He switches between seriousness and playful far too quickly "We need to bug out as soon as they want a piece of us!"

"Yeah, yeah, I'm on ya." I sigh as I draw a sword.

"What happened to your greatsword?" Hawk asked as he unleashes a barrage of ArcThunders towards the Risen.

_The nearest Risen have reacted to us attacking, but the majority is still focused, silent, on the temple itself._

"It broke; I've been too busy to remake it." I shrug, slashing at the nearest target.

He fires another Thoron into the Risen ranks. "Busy doing what?"

_Is it just me or is he really invested in the personal life of an ex-military enemy?_

"Hiring apprentice smiths." I say.

Hawk's body language didn't change all that much, but he did seem to relax just a tiny, tiny bit.

"Huh. That's boring." He grumbles.

Yeah, well…that's how it goes. "I'm starting to lose faith in your plan." I say after taking a moment to look at just how many people were between us and the money.

"You and everybody else." Hawk laughs. "I think we're good to go here. Alice!"

On cue, his Pegasus Knight swoops in and Hawk jumps onto her ride.

Since Cherche was flying with her we got a ride too.

"I can't see how that did anything save the expenditure of our own resources." Cherche mutters.

Same here.

The two of us double-riders head toward the temple, flying over the head of the still very silent and still Risen army. I think all of us have our fingers crossed going "please please PLEASE don't have any anti-air."

_Just as we were about to enter the entrance…_

A bright light from the sky, like a droplet of burning magnesium and early morning phone lights, descended into the temple at a breakneck speed.

That apparently was the cue for the Risen army, since suddenly they're now very active and very loud.

We're already indoors though.

"Told you that would work!" Hawk laughs.

"That wasn't even a plan!" I point out.

"Details, details!" Hawk waves it away. "Over there!" He points forward with a small puff of magic.

I follow his guide to see… someone passed out on the floor, with that unnatural bright light receding around him.

Must be Morgan.

_Quick! What's his hair color?!_

Not. Saying. Anything.

"That must be what we came for." Cherche says. "What you came for." She corrects herself.

"Probably; not that it matters, since leaving him here for the Risen to kill is horrible form." I say. "Take us down, let's get him out of here."

"Yes, let's." Cherche agrees and Minerva drops her altitude, gliding near the temple's smooth stone surface (and waterways) until she comes to a stop near the boy lying on the ground.

…

Yep, Morgan. He's surprisingly tiny though. Like, "smaller than the body type 2" tiny.

God he looks young…let's see.

_Cherche passes us a Vulnerary._

Take bottle. "Thanks." Uncork it, and pour it into Morgan's mouth. In retrospect this is a terrible idea since I don't know if he's going to choke on it or not.

Fortunately though, he does not choke on it and comes to with a groan.

"Ah…ow. Where…" He mumbles, and then gets a look at my face. "Oh…hey boss! You look…young." He says cheerfully, or as cheerfully as he can manage in his dazed state.

I smile. "Yeah, different time zones and all that. C'mon, let's get you out of here. Cherche! Help him up."

"Aunt Cherche! So good to see you." Morgan says sleepily.

I uh…judging by how Cherche's smile went from "warm and fuzzy" to "I will kill you in your sleep" and there was literally no physical difference I'm assuming she's no exactly happy with being called aunt.

Just a hunch.

Minerva growls at Morgan. "Minerva's here too…? What a weird dream."

I don't think he's entirely with us right now.

_Cherche helps Morgan up onto Minerva's back, where he will sit in front of her._

Good thing he's tiny, then.

"Time's a wastin', Ash." Hawk reminds me while staring intently at the temple entrance.

_The sound of the Risen army shambling in is getting louder._

Actually, why aren't they hell bent on killing us right now?

"Ok, we're good, let's go." I jump onto Minerva's back.

…Hawk has been in holding pattern over our heads for a while now.

_He's circling above us._

"Are you looking for something?" I yell up at him.

"Yeah." He responds.

...

_We hear a girl yell in the distance somewhere._

…

Oh fuck me. Of course. Of _course_.

If we have two Robins we're going to have two Morgans.

Hawk for one homed in on the girl!Morgan's voice like a guided missile (along with Alice, who is probably the mother) and the two zoomed straight towards…one of the back rooms to the temple.

"Are we assisting?" Cherche asks.

I nod, even though she can't see. "Yeah; follow them."

…

…

We fly into the back room of the temple and see…Girl!Morgan running away from a mob of Fighter Risen, screaming at the top of her lungs.

Hawk jumps down from his perch on the Pegasus with a loud roar, his hands crackling with electrical energy.

The Risen, not prone to surprises because they have no expectations, didn't care all that much for Hawk's little stunt, focused as they were on chasing down the screaming little girl running away from them.

Also, Fighter-type Risen are the slowest runners in the history of mankind.

Hawk intercepts the…what, eight? Risen and blows their head off with a burst of…Thoron? The amount of magical energy used implies that it was a Thoron, but the fact that it expanded from his hands in a cone instead of a beam means that it's a custom spell…but with Thoron levels of power.

Girl!Morgan, having heard the massive discharge of magical power over her own screaming, stop screaming and turn to look.

She then yells "Daddy!" really loudly and jumps to give Hawk a hug.

_More of a glomp than anything else though._

Key difference between them and the standard Morgan meets Robin meeting: The two seem to actually know each other.

_If you'll remember, in game Robin has no idea who Morgan is and has to be clued in._

So I suppose our Morgan is the default Morgan, while…Hawk's daughter came from the future with him?

"Introductions are a little late, but this is Kite." Hawk says, still holding onto his little daughter.

_She's not really little. She's Morgan's age…probably._

"Hi!" Kite waves at us enthusiastically.

_Until she sees us, and shrinks into her daddy's robes a little bit._

I really don't have a good reputation in the future, do I?

"You look a lot younger than before." She says to her dad.

"Thank Naga for that." He grins. "C'mon, let's get out of here."

Kite jumps off of Hawk (rather, she lets go of his neck) and jumps onto Alice's Pegasus. They also share a hug, and Hawk follows her onto their mount.

I look up.

_This side room is entirely enclosed, so we probably need to fight our way back to the main temple room._

Thought as much.

…

…

The fight itself was oddly simple; we just had to fly reasonably high enough while us mages (Hawk, Kite, Me, Alice) pelted the ground with wind spells and shoved all of the projectiles being hurled at us down, and as soon as the top of the temple was within sight Cherche and Alice went at top speed out of the temple.

After we rose out of the temple though…

"Risen Wyvern Riders." Cherche says, sounding like she's trying to kill them out of pure spite. "This is going to be tough."

"How's Morgan holding up there?" I ask.

"He's at least conscious enough to hold on to Minerva." Cherche replies. "We can probably escape if we avoid a fight altogether…" She scans the ground. "Although given the circumstances what comes afterwards might be tough."

Afterwards…yeah, if we leave and the Risen army comes after Morgan we will literally drag whichever settlement we flee into down with us.

_So our choices are to sacrifice a few thousand for Morgan…or to sacrifice Morgan for a few thousand._

…

Fuck it. It's too late to grow a conscience now. "Cherche, head north west; we'll make use of the garrison there."

"What?" She sounds surprised. "Are you sure they'll let us in?"

"We'll outfly the Risen army; there'll be plenty of time." This sucks, but at the same time a fortress is better defended to hold out against a squishy zombie attack than a town.

_We are aware that the fortress exists because they project their sphere of influence over a mining town that we buy iron from._

I've talked to the captain a few times when I travelled up here; it should work out for the better.

…What about Hawk?

"Hey! Ash!" I hear Hawk yell. "It looks like they're after your Morgan, so this is where I'll be leaving now!"

...Wait what?

_Hawk, true to his word, begins flying south. A few of the Risen Wyvern riders react to his movement and chase after him, but the majority is still here with us._

You son of a bitch! Get your ass back here and suffer with me!

_Hawk shoots down his chasers with well-placed wind spells._

"Did he just leave?" Cherche says disbelievingly. "What an asshole." She stares towards where Hawk disappeared into the night.

Newflash: I'm a bad linguistic influence.

"Nevermind him, let's get out of here. I'll provide support." I take out a wind tome, and Minerva accelerates and dives straight through the Risen ranks.

_Interesting note: These Risen seems to be entirely reactive; the fliers, at least, never made a move until we did. The instant we started moving the ground army started to move, too._

Was this why Hawk attacked them to begin with? Is there some kind of delay to their movements?

_Better question: did he know they would react like this? Also, Risen Wyverns to our right._

Pew, pew, pew.

_The Riders get pelted with wind spells and we manage to clip the wings of one of the Wyverns. The other two simply lost their riders and crash landed to the earth._

Huh. So if you unseat Rider-type Risen then their mount dies as well. Good to know.

_Hawk and Kite did seem to know each other._

And…ugh. I guess this confirms…or rather, it greatly supports Hawk's status as "Another Robin" instead of "Insane White-Haired Asshat Wearing Grima Robe". So did he come from the future? Kite mentioned Hawk being a lot younger than he used to be…was there time travel involved?

I need to pin him down one of these days and get a straight answer.

_He seemed a lot less keen on killing us this time around._

He wasn't really keen on killing us to begin with, I think; we got outplayed but for all his genre-savviness he didn't go for the killing blow immediately, even back in Plegia. Maybe he is just insane.

_Risen to the left, 2 units._

Pew, pew…

…

…

_We arrive at the fort ahead of the remaining flying Risen chasers, and definitely ahead of the Risen soldiers._

Big thanks to Minerva. She's pushed herself really hard and almost collapsed as soon as we hit the ground.

"Oh, if ain't Ash!" One of the guards on night watch says. "What brings you out here at this hour, sir?"

"Rescue," I point to Morgan, as he stumbles off of Minerva. "Risen army coming." I gesture to the darkness behind me. "Massive fucking army."

He takes a second to parse all the fragments, and then nods. "I'll wake our captain right away."

…

…

_The bulk of the enemy air force arrives well before their land army as expected, and the captain sets up defensive positions._

"Last I heard they were busy defiling a temple. What made them come up here?" The captain wondered.

"I guess they answered whatever question they had about the place." I'm getting better at lying with a straight face now.

"Pah. Luck is too much to rely on nowadays." The captain grumbles. "Alright, lads! Look alive!"

All the archers and mages aim towards the sky.

_Estimating according to the torchlight, we have maybe two hundred men present._

The enemy air force is oddly tiny, fortunately…maybe around fifty Wyverns tops.

"Ready…" The captain calls out, and I hear bowstrings tighten in comparison.

_The Wyvern riders dive towards the front line of heavy armor, because they're apparently immensely stupid._

"Fire!"

_The sound of bowstrings and arrows and Risen crashing into the ground tells us that the Risen attackers are Dead As Shit™._

The remainder of the Risen airforce slams into the heavy armor Knights arranged on the wall and break themselves in the process.

_The momentum of the charge is nothing to laugh at though; some of the Knights were bowled over by the impact and probably broke something as a result._

"Easy." The captain grins as his men roar their victory.

…

There's a bit of downtime until the next wave comes.

"Ash, do you really think this fortress will hold against the enemy army? I want your professional opinion." The captain asks.

Uh… "It's going to be tough; this batch of Risen seems to be much more fragile than normal, but at the same time…weight in numbers and all that. That being said, they seem to have some fundamental weaknesses we can exploit, so it should be doable."

The captain nods. "I thought as much; bring out our entire stores! We're fighting until the bitter end!"

Cheers from the garrison.

_We sound so enthusiastic._

Well the cheering itself is lackluster.

…

_I guess this is worst part about a night defense battle; the darkness really saps morale._

On the other hand, I think this place has enough arrows and spears to kill a small country, so we have that going for us.

_Which is nice._

"Ash." Cherche says softly. "I don't think Minerva's going to be able to fly again tonight. Is there something else I can do?"

…I'm not asking you to do anything. "Keep an eye on Morgan for me."

"Is he important?" Cherche asks.

I pause. "I…honestly?"

Honestly, Morgan is a side character and he isn't even overly important. If he dies before meeting Robin literally nothing bad will happen, because people are dying every day and we sure as hell don't miss them.

He doesn't even have the major Grima blood that makes Robin valuable.

_But the Risen wanted him dead._

"He's important enough for someone to send an army after; that's about all I'm going on." I admit sheepishly.

Cherche nods solemnly. "I understand; I'll protect him with my life."

Uh…no, you're not.

"It's not protection if either of you die, alright?" Like I don't exactly have a full-blown romantic interest in Cherche (and Gerome's an asshole, even if he's a male tsundere) but at the same time it would leave a bad taste in my mouth to see her die.

"I understand." Cherche smiles.

I hear snickering from the eavesdropping guards.

_We may be shipped._

And one of them will write fanfiction about the two of us.

_God that would just be so meta._

Would it be fanfiction or would it just be fiction?

…

…

_Soon enough, we can feel the enemy legions arrayed beneath the fortress walls. I say feel because before the enemy got here it was just 'dark' but now the darkness got taller, so the distinction is not very visually clear._

Perk for tonight though: there's not a cloud in the sky and the moon is pretty sizeable.

Although considering the numbers we're up against being able to see all of them (even if it's just silhouettes) isn't good for morale.

The guard captain whistles. "Wow. Someone owes me a promotion after this." He then takes a deep breath. "Alright, lads! Looks alive! This is a good time to be a Soldier of Ferox!"

That's a pretty common line, it sounds like.

He looks at me. "If you want out…well, now's the time."

Pah. "I didn't come here just to run away; let's do this."

He grins. "Well said. Archers, ready!"

_We hear the archers draw their strings amidst quiet a lot of muttered curses._

"Fire!"

…

On one hand, we have 100% accuracy.

On the other hand…

"It's impressively difficult to tell if we're doing any damage." The Guard Captain (whose name is Stephan, as I found out about five minutes ago) said lightly. "And we're using fire arrows too."

I'm starting to wonder if the copious use of fire arrows was what caused the massive destruction.

_Probably not._

_…_

_Roughly five minutes into the battle later._

"Sir, the Risen are at the front gate." One of the archers said, before he pushed something off of the wall onto the Risen below.

"Damage?" Stephan asks.

"Not a lot, but they're going to break through the gate through sheer numbers pretty soon." The archer replied with a little bit of worry.

"Thought as much; what's the wall situation?"

"Surprisingly clear." Another archer said. "None of the wall guards report any potential breaches at all, it seems as if the Risen aren't trying too hard today."

"Well that makes it easy." Stephan then takes a deep breath. "Heavy Armor! To the gate!"

_The heavy armor Knights form a two-layer thick human barricade of steel and pointy things._

Them plus some overturned and weighed down carts used to make an impromptu kill zone. If the Risen numbers are anything to go by the carts won't stay in place for too long.

_The Risen force the reinforced but still wooden gate open with no real difficulty._

Why are they so silent though? It's unnerving…and unusual.

_The only thing we hear is the Risen's footsteps (a lot of footsteps), the whistle of the arrows, and our guys yelling to boost morale._

"Brace!" Stephan roars, and the Risen first line crashes into the Heavy Knights.

_And what are doing to help?_

We're on the second floor, pelting the kill zone with spell books. This fort has a good stock of cheap Fires and Thunders.

…

[Ten minutes later]

I wish I had something descriptive to say about the whole thing, but it's like grinding for experience in chapter 17 (with the single-entrance throne room). It's incredibly dull.

The Heavies are killing, and the Risens are dying, the archers are just shooting down onto the ground. We're experiencing zero countering fire, too. This would be a cakewalk if we were not in danger of running out of things to shoot them with.

…

Another ten minutes later, and we rapidly begin to see a problem.

Stephan came to the same conclusion. "Heavies! Fall back and use the Risen corpses as new barricades! Archers! Cover their repositioning!"

_The Heavy Knights draw back a little and use the piles of Risen bodies as new makeshift walls; some of the soldiers on relief duty (people dedicated to bringing in torches, spears, arrows, and so on) repositioned a few carts and overturned them against the Risen corpses to make the deathwall a little more durable._

"Never thought I'd see the day where a dead undead is more problematic than an undead undead." Stephan said thoughtfully. "Do these things evaporate?"

"If they do they don't do it very fast." I reply. It's a good thing he's up here with us mages since the spells we shoot at the Risen help light up the place a little.

_Us being 'us' and like ten NPC mages._

"Damn. We run the risk of dying to garbage." Stephan snarls. "Support units! Make some additional barricades, and prepare to expand the kill zone. Archers, how are their numbers?"

"If we've made a dent, I don't see it." One of the wall Archers growls. "If their plan is to annoy us to death, it's working."

Stephan laughs. "If you can complain you can shoot, so get shooting."

The Archer, in response, nocks like five arrows at once and fires them off into the darkness.

_The torchlight is messing with our night vision a little bit. We can see everything happening in the courtyard but beyond the walls is nothing._

WHICH BRINGS UP A GOOD POINT.

The fortress itself is shaped…well, like a set of boxes. There's the main outer wall with the gate, and the entrance into the fort courtyard is about half a floor down. The courtyard itself is a gentle slope, with the gate entrance being the lowest spot and the primary structure (armory, barracks, so forth) being the highest. The outer wall is about two floors up and is where most of the archers are; the reserve forces are ferrying supplies along the wall edge, with their path lighted up by the torches.

Full disclosure: I don't really have anything to do so I'm looking around (shooting fish in a barrel isn't really attention consuming). I also don't have a good sense of distance.

Let's see…this secondary layer of wall (really just the roof for the blocky main structure entrance) is roughly two and a half stories up, populated by eleven mages (myself included), a Cherche, and a Captain Stephan.

The Archers are shooting fire arrows by lighting their arrows on the torches, and none of them seem at all interested in firing arrows one at a time. They still seem to shoot with deadly force, so that's good.

Uh…what else?

There're the two layers of Heavy Knights and they're slowly being pushed back by the advancing wave of literally dead zombies (and the alive undead zombies doing the pushing). I'm still not sure why they don't just evaporate like the other normal zombies.

Also, the Risen are climbing over the two story walls.

…

Fuck.

_Risen Revenants are clambering over the walls with disturbing agility despite having goo for legs._

"Archers, back! Now!" Stephan yells quickly, and the Archers flee from the walls as we watch the nightmare of every zombie flick ever: hundreds of glowy red eyes climbing over walls higher than they are.

"We're not reclaiming the walls?" Cherche pulls out a poleaxe from one of the many weapon stashes around her.

"Given how they just climbed the walls, I don't want to risk something else happening." Stephan says tersely. "Archers! Barricade the wall doors, and then report up here! Mages, provide covering fire."

"On it like yesterday." I pull out a customized Wind spell book (custom made by me! It fires a wind ball at the target and then it explodes!)

_It doesn't have any cutting power, only staggering force._

Fire! Fire! Fire!

_Interestingly enough: everyone is using fire, we're the only ones using wind._

…

The situation has taken a turn for the shitty. The Risen have –god knows how- overrun the entire section of the wall containing the fortress entrance.

_Undead flesh ramp?_

Most likely, actually.

Either way, Stephan has committed all of the rest of the infantry; some of the reserves get to be Soldiers and support the Heavy Knight flank, while others bring out every last arrow we have onto our vantage point and grab bows.

"Ha. This is more like it." Stephan grins menacingly as he snipe the Risen with incredible speed.

_This is just a slugfest now; who can take more damage before buckling._

_Risen Revenants are also climbing up the secondary walls (again, god knows how) but Cherche and Stephan's personal guards keep them at bay._

Also, Cherche is fucking terrifying. She spins herself around and around with her Poleaxe outstretched to get the maximum amount of cleave with her axe.

And then she does a "This is Sparta" kick to any Risen body parts that doesn't fall onto the courtyard.

…

…

_Our spell books ran dry._

Sword time! Although we can only stab at the climbers.

_Crossbow?_

I lost my arrows somewhere in flight.

…

…

…

[Almost Noon]

Holy fucking shit.

We killed every last one of them.

It's a testament to how LONG this fight took when Morgan woke up from his…interdimensional jet lag, I guess? And…uh, I guess he helped us defend himself? It's a little weird.

_Not for very long though, Morgan's spell book didn't last and he didn't have a pocket spell book for the little things._

"Naga save us." Stephan breathed. "If every Risen fight is like that they'll overrun the continent for sure."

_We peer over the wall and into the courtyard being lit by the rising sun._

Corpses, corpses everywhere. There shouldn't BE this many corpses in such a small area, but there it is. The courtyard now looks like a garbage dump of nothing but bodies.

At some point during the night the troops on the ground pulled a full retreat; the amount of dead Risen bodies was piling up so high they blocked the main entrance into the fortress proper.

Naturally, it meant that the Risen could get to the second level after a little bit of more corpse-ramping, but at the same time it made them easier to kill; the mages just shot Elfires at the ramps until it stopped squirming.

Of however many people were present in the original garrison, only…what, fifteen people are left alive? The rest are either dead (I certainly see a few human corpses around here) or missing under that mass of corpses.

_It's…not good for your heart, to see men dodge too close a pile of corpses and then get dragged into it by a clawing Revenant hand. It made us all on edge._

Cherche tossed the broken remainders of a Poleaxe casually over her shoulder. "I say we burn this place to the ground. It'll be a nice send-off to the fallen heroes."

Stephan nods slowly. "Yeah. And a nice 'fuck you' to whoever sent these guys."

…

_Apparently these Risen corpses burn well._

Must help not having a body made mostly of water.

…

As we watch the fortress's walls contain the massive blaze…

I…

In order to save Morgan, I indirectly killed nearly two hundred people, each and every one more useful than he is.

Not only that, I also caused the destruction of a key Feroxi garrison in the area.

_Was it worth it? Is Morgan, who can't self-kill with Grima or swing the Exalted Falchion, worth it? Regardless of what rhetoric we use, the fact is we valued the life of one boy over the life of a few hundred, every last one of them someone else's son, daughter, father, or mother, and their lives no less important just because you don't know them._

"Don't let anyone die." Huh…

_While we are not the Clairvoyant Robin, the fact is if we simply left Morgan alone then none of this would've happened._

Morgan would've died as a result.

_Many more died tonight because of what we did. We sure as hell didn't bust our necks trying to save any of _them_._

"Ash?" I shake my head; Stephan is addressing me. "Are you alright?"

"Yeah. Yeah." I stare into the inferno. "Just…tired. It's been a long two days."

"I can imagine." Stephan says softly. "I'm going to report back to the Khans with my men; you should go home and properly rest…I'd imagine you'll need it." He claps me on the shoulder. "Men, we're heading out."

That…that sounds good right now.

Yeah.

"May we fight again someday." Stephan calls out as he heads toward the direction of the Longfort.

_We think._

…

"Ash?" Cherche asks quietly, as we stare into the fire burning brightly.

_See that? That's the proof of everything we fucked up, and there was literally nothing we could've done to make the situation better._

"Are you…all right?" _Cherche gently puts her hand on our shoulder._

"I…I just need a minute." _We sit. _"Just a little bit."

_Cherche looks between the flames and us; Minerva sits behind us, playing (very reluctantly) with a happy Morgan. _"Don't blame yourself; you made the best strategic decision available."

'Best decision' my ass. If only you knew.

_And yet we make no effort to correct her._

_Cherche sits down next to us and leans against our arm. _"You're a lot like Virion…both of you take on far more responsibility than either of you deserve."

…

_So where do we go from here?_

I…I need to keep going. Losses are unavoidable. If I'm going to achieve the kind of goals I'm aiming for, I'll need to keep going.

I have to keep going.

_So we've made our peace?_

…Yeah.

We're good.

Very good.

Definitely good.

_Keep telling yourself that…maybe you'll actually believe it._

So much for it being 'too late for a conscience'.

.

.

.

{ === + === }

Author notes:

Boy!Morgan GET!

Girl!Morgan GET!


	21. Interlude - 3

{ === + === }

…

_Still awake?_

…

Yeah.

_You've been lying in bed for like 3 hours now, not sleeping._

_…_

I'm aware.

…

…

…

"Ash…you don't look good."

Nowi stares at my face during breakfast.

"I didn't sleep well." I shrug. "It happens sometimes." Even back on Earth I was a bit of a night owl…came with the territory of being a computer guy, I suppose.

"Are you sure?" Nowi pats my head.

_She sits on our right, Ninya sits on our left; Cherche's already gone out to the Wyvern stables._

Cherche is impressively tough.

I smile. "Yeah, I'm sure. Thanks."

…

_We're not really fine, for those of you wondering._

The fact that I erected a human shield without the humans knowing about the fact that they were a human shield doesn't sit well with me.

_We're going to raise and equip an air force capable of fighting a one-million man army._

The thought is a hell of a lot different than the reality.

_The reality is we're going to need resources to house and equip the riders that will be sent to us very soon._

I'm actually not sure how soon "very soon" is. Basilio's letter yesterday wasn't very clear, but at the very least it looks like we're making progress.

_And? How willing are you to sacrifice a village for a squad in the future? This isn't a question we can put off, mind you, we're not good enough at split second decisions for that. If faced with the choice of abandoning, say, Cherche, in favor of a squadron, can we do it?_

Likewise, can we abandon an entire squadron to save Cherche?

_The best answer is obviously "Save both", but just because we want to doesn't mean it will work out that way. Hell, if we don't move fast enough the answer might even turn out to be "lose both."_

"Ow!"

"You're not with us today, are ya?" Nowi grumbles.

_She flicked us on the forehead._

"Sorry."

Nowi pouts. "Seriously. Something weird with you lately. Is it because of that Morgan?"

Yeah. "Something like that." I nod.

_Morgan, by the way, has been adopted into our house for the time being. He left with Cherche early this morning (probably)._

Morgan's super inquisitive and friendly. He's like a younger Lissa without the pranking…and male.

"I heard from Cherche." Nowi says. "You guys messed with an entire Risen army and walked out ok, right?"

"A lot of other people died so we could be ok." I scowl.

"I see." Nowi says. "So what would've happened if you left those things alone?"

I… "I don't know." I say. "And that's why it worried me."

Nowi sighs. "Ash."

She then bops me on the head. "You made the best decision considering the circumstances, so don't blame yourself for making a hard call, alright?"

She then gives us a tiny cool down hug.

_Tiny because she feels really frail, despite, y'know, being a murder dragon in a travel-sized package._

…

I blame myself for making the hard call precisely because I don't know if the call was right; at the end of the day we sacked a fortress, a clear and valuable asset to the safety and well-being of the people, in favor of…well, Morgan, who is a potential asset to us, and only us.

Like…because the fortress was sacked, the local mines closed down to the Risen crawling in the mining tunnels.

_The active mind is assuming that it was because the fortress was lost._

The fortress acted as a middle point between the mines and the nearby village. Without it the village guard was forced to hunker down and fight it out with the Risen attack with no expectation of friendly reinforcements arriving in the same day, and thus the mining tunnels were overrun…and naturally, no militia with any kind of self-preservation will dive into a deep dark tunnel full of an unknown number of vapor zombies.

_We ARE going to make harder calls once the invasion of Valm occurs, you know? Depending on Walhart's policies as a conqueror and the integrity of his officers, the body count we're going to rack up is going to be pretty high._

…

_*sigh* the active mind spends the rest of the day halfheartedly working, and as such not much got done._

…

…

…

_Y'know, at this rate you're not going to get any sleep ever._

Ugh. I guess I might as well take Nowi's advice and go on a night walk…probably not very far though. Just onto the roof.

…

This is going to become a nightly occurrence now, I feel.

…

…

[Random Events Time]

…

…

While Ash is busy fighting his inner demons, let's take a look at the rest of the Ylissean Continent.

The civil war in Plegia is still going on strong, with ever decreasing losses every day due to the common people's desires to live despite serving under generals who are bloodthirsty enough to be considered clinically insane.

Well, it would be more accurate to say that the reason for the decreasing losses was because of excess food stocks in Plegia running dry, and thus all the Plegian Generals are tightening their belts when it comes to offense and defense. Some of them were smart enough to try and rob caravans, but when caravans between Plegian territories no longer exist…it's kind of hard to steal something from nothing.

As such, the civil war settled down to a less bloody version of itself, with small skirmishes happening and lives lost every day, but certainly not on the massive near-genocidal levels that it had before. While the Grimleal priests are constantly trying to fan the flames of war, fortunately even their influence has limits.

The civil war influences the other countries as well, as you might expect:

Ylisstol's Pegasus Knights spend their time patrolling the skies daily, looking for any potential bandit intrusions or refugees from Plegia due to the constant turmoil. The bandits are summarily dealt with, and any refugees are escorted to the nearest town, due to Emmeryn's decree that any refugees are to be assisted in every capacity. Unfortunately the local village leaders and town mayors tend to have less philanthropic ideas about the treatment of refugees, and Emmeryn's reputation suffers as a result.

Ferox isn't a whole lot better. The border towns have a general consensus to lock down their gates whenever Plegians show up, causing more than one accident every week as they mistake a trade caravan from not-Plegia as a caravan from Plegia. Eventually people wisened up and decided to approach the border towns from directions that are definitely not from Plegia.

It sucks to be a Plegian, is what I'm getting at.

The Risen are still appearing across the continent (and probably in Valm too) in sporadic numbers on a disturbingly rigid schedule (for example, Ylisstol gets a Risen drop every Wednesday at 00:34 in the morning, it's mostly Soldiers/Bandits and ninety percent of them always show up in the Southern Courtyard). Fortunately this means that towns experiencing Risen attacks have developed smarter and smarter ways to deal with the air-dropped undead.

The best anti-zombie quick fix award goes to an Ylissean fishing village that decided to place tough fishing nets over the drop site so when the Risen drop they just hit the nets at maximum speed and die due to Physics. It's a good thing they are all vapor zombies or the land underneath the Net of Death would be utterly soaked with blood and body parts.

…

…

[And the days go by]

…

…

[Point of Interest: Valm]

[Probably the Port City for Chapter 15]

…

…

The daily patrol is endless, and boring. Most of the guards placed on patrol are the ones too undependable to patrol the streets…especially after last night's massive alcohol-induced brawl.

One of the guards adjusted his hat. "To think that the guard captain would put us up here." He said, looking down from his perch on the watchtower. "You think he's angry at us?"

The other guard glared at him. "You tossed a fig at his head."

"It was an accident!" The first guard protested. "I was trying to hit the person behind him. You know, the man who was directly behind our captain using him for cover."

The second guard sighed. "See, stupid things like that are why we're up here instead of out on the streets."

"It's not like we can _do _anything on the streets; Valm's got eyes everywhere." The first guard sneered. "At least we can take some good shots from up here." He shook his bow for emphasis.

"Just don't send another Valm bastard to the healers again; we don't need that kind of attention." The second guard reminded him.

"I know, I know."

…

Unknown to both of them, a man wearing a hooded robe listened in to their conversation, and once he was certain nothing more of interest was going to be said (which was very fast) he made a quick getaway from the base of the tower.

Valm as a continent, fortunately, worships Naga, and although the populace can't be considered devotedly religious most people know to mind their own business if they see anyone wearing a sign of Naga.

As such, the hooded man made his way out of the town (towards the Mila Tree, house of the Speaker) without conflict.

Naturally, he didn't go to the Yggdrasil knockoff, but instead made a sharp left turn when he was out of sight of the town's gates, ducking into the entrance of a dense, dense forest.

After travelling for about another fifteen minutes, the hooded man came across a small camp.

"Ah…Gaius, how goes your trip?" Virion asked amicably, sitting on a small stool.

Gaius pulled back his hood. "About as good as usual; this disguise is impressively good."

Virion chuckled. "That's because it's authentic. I received it as a gift from a Priestess of Naga in my earlier years."

Gaius…looks at the sleeves of the robes with alarm, then disgust, then resignation. "Back when you actually succeeded in your skirt-chasing, I guess?"

Virion's shrug was noncommittal. "Fortunately the priestess was very open-minded…and enjoyed learning new things."

"Ok, no longer going down that path of thought." Gaius sighed. "Alright, so here's what I got for today."

Virion nods.

Gaius starts counting down his fingers. "The town port is badly maintained, and since it's a fishing village first and foremost any attacks from the ocean will have to be done with small boats; anything bigger will probably get stuck before it can reach the shoreline. The villagers are mostly content with their lives, though small disputes flare every now and then between them and the town guard…the town guard, incidentally, is made up of a small but elite Valm troop and a lot of local militia."

"So if we attacked carelessly it would only serve to alienate us against the local people." Virion mutters.

Gaius nods. "Yeah, and it also makes holding this territory easier…if this was Walhart's idea then he's got this conqueror thing figured out pretty well."

"That he does." Virion mutters. "Anything else?"

"The elites have well maintained gear, and the local guards have some reserve supplies. The granaries are pretty bare, and I didn't see anything that suggested a levy armory. If we were to arrive on land from here, then we'll need to leave almost immediately, and even if we do there's no guarantee Walhart will simply leave the town alone afterwards."

Virion laughed sadly. "I see…he leaves the bare minimum for the good people to survive on and as a result derives us of the chance to counterattack."

Gaius scratches his face nervously. "Well, not necessarily…we could use improvised weapons."

Virion glares at him in response, and Gaius holds his hands up as if to surrender. "It's just a possibility."

"Fortunately, not a possibility Lady Robin will jump on." Virion murmurs. "Alright, good enough; let's move on." He stood to remove a map of Valm pinned to the nearby tree.

Gaius opened his bag of goodies. "You sure? The locals gave me some pretty good stuff." He took out some kind of bread.

"Yes…we have a lot of ground to cover." Virion said as he poured over the slightly tattered map in his hands.

…

…

[Point of Interest: Kellam]

…

…

I don't know where he is.

_I have consistently forgotten about him throughout the entirety of the story._

_Seriously every time Kellam shows up it's because I go "Oh shit I forgot about Kellam."_

_I even lost him in the unit roster a few times._

We eventually found him though, so that's good.

…

…

[Point of Interest: Ylisstol]

[Ylisstol Castle]

…

…

Robin has felt a weird chill down her spine for the past…well, ever since the end of the Plegian war, as if someone was constantly looking at her from behind a nearby pillar.

Today she figured out who it was.

"Tharja…what are you doing?" Robin asked the black-haired woman staring hungrily at her from behind the nearest pillar.

"Observing." Tharja smirked.

Robin felt worried…about more things than one. "Observing…me?"

Tharja rolls her eyes. "Well, naturally; nobody else around here is interesting enough for me to care about."

"Thanks…I guess?" Robin felt the urge to find a small room and lock herself away for a few hours.

"Well…if I could have a closer examination that would be even better." Tharja murmurs as she seemingly creeps toward Robin (despite not moving an inch).

Robin felt as if the castle guards weren't doing their jobs.

The castle guards, for the record, did their jobs of patrolling the grounds properly, but when someone like Tharja (amazingly creepy) is dressed the way she is (amazingly hot) the guards feel the need to stay out of her way just so they don't find themselves dead by the next morning. The fact that Chrom vouched for Tharja's credentials as a Shepherd made them even less willing to interfere with the Creepy Attractive Robin Stalking Lady.

Thus Robin was left alone against Tharja, the queen of the personal bubble invaders, and right now she'd think of herself as rather helpless against this lady standing in front of her (well, not really; Tharja's still behind the pillar and well out of arm's reach, but you get the idea).

"Well…?" Tharja pressed on, with a smile on her face.

Robin saw nothing behind that smile but terror and agony. "Uh…I'm gonna…go. Over there." She said, pointing to a random direction away from Tharja…and then ran away.

Tharja, giggling like a madwoman, followed after her.

…

Behind Tharja, Miriel followed the two of them with her notebook, scribbling furiously and also giggling like mad.

…

Two guards watched the three women train with disinterest. "Do you want to stop them?" One of them said to another one, motioning toward Tharja.

The other guard stared at Tharja's stripperific outfit, then at Miriel's furious note-taking. "Nah, let them do their thing."

…

Chrom looked up in alarm when Robin ran into the training room and slammed the door behind her.

"Tharja." Robin breathed before Chrom got a word in.

"Ok, sure…but why did you run?" Chrom asked, perplexed.

"She creeps me out. No offense." Robin muttered. "Something about her doesn't sit right with me."

"Really now." Fredrick (who was training with Chrom) murmured. "Perhaps you can be of service to me for a small task, if Tharja is giving you trouble."

_Uh oh. _Robin thought, as Fredrick strode up to the door Robin had just closed and opened it.

As expected, Tharja was almost ready to pick the lock on the door. Now that the door's open however, she found herself face to face to the towering guardian that is Fredrick.

A Fredrick, it should be mentioned, with a terrifying glare and a calm smile.

"Tharja…how wonderful of you to join us." Fredrick said calmly.

"Uh…maybe another time." Tharja said quickly and turned to leave, before she felt the deathgrip of Fredrick on her shoulder and froze.

"Now now." Fredrick's smile made Robin feel sorry for the personal space invader. "Your Fitness Hour has waited long enough."

Chrom and Robin shared an alarmed look and tried to escape from the room as quickly as possible.

But it was impossible to escape from the Fredrick Fitness Hour.

(Unless you were Miriel, who was smart enough to call off the chase the instant Robin headed towards the training rooms).

…

…

[Point of Interest: Lucina]

[Location Unknown]

…

...

Lucina stared blankly at the mug in her right hand while her left absentmindedly played with her now red hair.

Sitting at the same table beside her, Yarne constantly shifts between glancing nervously at red-haired Lucina and at the entrance to the little inn they're sitting in.

"Uh…Lucina, you're sure we're not exposed here, right?" Yarne asks for the fifth time.

Lucina by now knows Yarne isn't asking for an answer, and simply nods slightly in response.

"It's really weird seeing your hair red." Yarne says again after another minute passes.

"Not many people have blue hair around here." Lucina says quietly.

"Not many people have your sense of cover, either." Laurent chides regally as he drops into an empty chair at the table. "Sorry to have kept you all waiting."

"My sense of cover? My cover was pretty good, if I do say so myself." Lucina smirks, visibly relaxing now that the person she was waiting for had arrived save and sound.

Laurent shook his head. "Really now? You are either the crown princess of Ylisse…or its greatest hero of yore. It's not very often we can just shout 'Marth' or 'Lucina' in a crowded space and not attract some form of ill-wanted attention."

Lucina shrugged. "The other me hasn't been born yet."

"For only a few more months…supposedly Queen Sumia is already deciding on a name." Laurent said. "Well, enough of that, I suppose."

"Yeah, yeah. This place makes me nervous." Yarne says quickly.

"Fine, fine." Lucina sighs. "So what did you learn?" She asks Laurent.

"Not much." Laurent admits. "This village supports a nearby fortress, and the fortress lord is supposedly a very cunning and underhanded individual, and his henchmen are all dropouts from the Plegian military. Compared to the rest of Plegia right now that's hardly newsworthy, but recently it seems as if they invited some venerable Armored Knight from the south…she and her apprentices." Laurent adjusts his glasses. "Sounds familiar?"

"Kjelle…I still can't help but feel like we missed Nah." Yarne says.

Lucina didn't seem bothered. "You know how Ash treated Nah. Between all of us she's probably the only one who can survive unaided on her own." She plays with the ends of her hair again. "Kjelle's master, huh…? What do you know about her?" She asks both of them.

Laurent self-consciously adjusts his oversized hat. "Again, not much: she's an armored knight and very skilled, but little beyond that. Given what the Boss told us of her, however, it might be safe to assume that she is a trusting person…very unfortunate given the current circumstances."

"Well, the Boss never told us about the civil war, either." Yarne grumbles. "Seems like a pretty big oversight to me."

"Plegia never fell to pieces during our time, Yarne." Laurent chides him. "Had you paid attention to your studies—"

"Ain't nobody got time for dat." Yarne grins, getting a deep 'why do I bother' sigh from Laurent. "So, what, are we saving Kjelle's master as well?" He asks Lucina.

Lucina nods. "If it is within our power to do so; scout around the fortress until Kjelle's entourage arrives, we can decide on what to do from there."

"I thought you didn't accept the Boss's ideology." Laurent says with some surprise.

Lucina scowls. "I don't agree with his methods, but I certainly understand his motivation to save as many lives as he can, and _that_ I do agree with."

Laurent nods, satisfied with her answer.

…

The three of them exits the Plegian Inn for not more than a few steps when they were confronted by a band of drunks.

By the way guys? Don't drink (alcohol) during the middle of the day. Hydration's important but getting wasted before noon is bad.

_This has been your ill-placed Public Service Announcement._

"Hey…pretty redhead. Come and play with us for a change, yeaH?" Drunkard A slurs.

Lucina, having been raised around Ash's aversion to alcohol, stared at the group with ill-disguised distaste.

"Ah…you don't know us, do ya?" Drunkard A continues to say. "We'RE PLEgian regulars…we keep pretTIEs like you from having your face bloodied up…we do GOOD work for the people, you know?"

"Let's go." Lucina says coldly.

"Hey, hey…" Drunkard B moves to block her path. "Our buddy wa being NICE, why are you ignoring him like thatUH!?"

"We're Pleggie soldiers…" Drunkard C grins. "So we take…and no askin' nicely."

All the Drunkards seem to realize by this point that they're, y'know, soldiers (sloshed out of their mind, sure) and move to grab Lucina.

Drunkard A lunges in first.

Yarne stops him with a solid punch to the chest.

Drunkard A is now no longer lunging and is on the ground.

"Sorry guys, but if I don't step in I'm going to have nightmares about Lucina's blade work again." Yarne mutters, getting an agitated look from Lucina aimed at his back.

"It's true. You are _far_ too willing to use sharp pointed objects at our…well." Laurent says, suddenly realizing that the lady willing to use sharp pointed objects at man's greatest treasure (and weakness) is standing within arm's reach.

Lucina sheathes her half-drawn Falchion. "It's a perfectly reasonable form of defense." She huffs.

"OY….KIDs like you can just FUCK OFF!" Drunkard B snarls and lunges toward Yarne.

"You guys are empty handed." Yarne points out, adjusting his arm guards until tiny nubs appeared on the edges, just barely extending out from his fist.

Drunkard B then felt three lightning quick blows to his chest before the blur in front of him spun and kicked him into the wall of the opposite building (a good ten meters away (approx. 40 feet)).

"And I…am Yarne." Yarne smirks. "Come at me."

The rest of the Drunkards (C to F) felt that it was now ok to lunge at Yarne at the same time.

Yarne, in response, joins his two fists together (so the little nubs touched) and took on a ready stance. As the Drunkards got closer, Yarne focused his mind and punched the air.

The little nubs on the punching hand crackled with magical power and a CRACK resounded through the empty town square. The discharge from the little nubs sent all of the Drunkards back flying, the sudden flash of light still dancing in their head and making their alcohol addled senses go haywire.

"Heh heh. Yarne special: Bright Claw." Yarne says, grinning widely, as he re-adjusted his arm guards again to retract the nubs.

"You need to spend less time with Cythia." Laurent pointed out as he took off the magnetized sunglasses lens from his normal glasses. "She teaches you nothing but theatrics."

"Seriously." Lucina agrees; she had simply turned her head away when Yarne took his stance.

_Both were trying to protect their eyesight from the bright flash of light._

"Does the trick, doesn't it?" Yarne grins. "Now let's get out of here before people start asking uncomfortable questions." He says with a jerk of his head towards the heads poking out of the inn...and all the other houses lined up along the street.

…

…

…

[October, Year 1]

[First Person Camera]

…

As Summer runs away from Fall (who will eventually run away very quickly for Winter who will stay for a long fucking time in Ferox before Spring finally kicks his lazy ass out of the house) I find myself…well, nothing much really.

Training and Politics, Politics and Training, day in, day out, pretty simple, pretty straightforward. We haven't seen anything else interesting happen since that day.

But it looks like it's going to change really damn soon.

_Because we're making it change._

"Ah…Ash, it's been a while." Mustafa greets me as I hop off from Magna's back.

"Last time I came here was a week ago." I grin. "Miss me that badly?"

He laughs. "As you have so elegantly put it: 'fucking court pleasantries.' So, what can I help you with today?"

Down to business. "I've secured the land assets necessary to build the dry docks, so I'm here looking for people."

He raises an eyebrow. "That's pretty fast…"

I shrug. "Yeah, money talks; how does things look on your end?"

"A week is enough for experimentation." Mustafa nods. "Come with me."

…

I follow him out of his castle courtyard as we do a walkthrough of Mustafa's town.

There's nothing much to say. From an economic standpoint, the buildings lined up on the main streets of the town are well-maintained but not heavily decorated, and the people don't seem to be too worried about the oncoming winter.

_Our two towns might as well be sister cities at this point, considering how warm the relations are between the merchants._

I'm pretty sure I also saw an Anna at one point or another.

Anyways, he leads us down the main street towards the docks while the common people greet us.

Not to toot my own horn, but I'm reasonably famous now.

_Our reputation as a 'genius' is spreading._

A genius of intellectual theft, maybe.

…Anyways.

"As you can see…" Mustafa gestures to the skeleton of two ships currently dry docked on the sandy beach. "Construction is going well." He waves back to the dock workers who wave and call out to him.

Re-construction would be more like it: we're not really making the ships from scratch…just enough from scratch to change quite a few things.

I have to admit, I'm not a navy buff…like, not even close, so a lot of these designs are achieved due to collaboration between us, our shipwrights, and Mustafa's shipwrights (as well as input from your average fishermen and sailors).

Alright, so first up on the menu: these new ships are being built without sails.

Instead, they will use a modern-ish engine (adapted to use magic) as its primary means of propulsion. I've been testing the engine on and off for the past two months and it's…promising. I'm kind of banking on the fact that magic has consistently exceeded my expectations for this to work, though.

Anyways…secondly, the ships use a small amount of steel in its construction (we just don't have the forging power to make the quantity of steel required for a modern destroyer) and the steel is made out of the improved forges, designed to maximize oxygen intake and minimize the amount of impurities in the steel.

_Disclaimer: we have no idea how any of this stuff works._

We have SOME idea of how it works.

"I have to admit I'm not familiar with ship construction, but it feels strange to see a ship without a mast." Mustafa says. "Are you sure this is feasible, foreman?"

For the record, he's asked this question every time we went to the docks.

"Well…it's not possible to follow this design concept exactly." The shipwright says (like he does every time Mustafa asks said question) "But with the modifications we've made it should be plenty possible."

We're still using wood (albeit with steel reinforcements) so there's a limitation to how the ship is going to look…not having welding sucks, I guess? But regardless they should be faster, stronger, and better than anything else on the high seas for a long, long time.

"So I take it the other dry docks are ready for service?" The foreman asks me, and I nod. "Good, good…I have crew ready to go, we can start bringing in material immediately, with your permission, of course." He glances at Mustafa.

"Naturally." Mustafa nods.

"Yeah…do you guys need anything? We have some free space in the Workshop for the next few weeks." I ask…it's a partnership, after all.

The shipwright nods. "Actually, yes, here." He hands me a small list. "If it isn't too much trouble."

Let's see…all small parts. I nod. "Yeah, shouldn't be a problem."

…

_And we talk about more small things for some hours._

The fact that Flavia gave me a blank check to do whatever I want (plus me spending tons of money on the common people) really makes it easy to do whatever the hell I want for any reason whatsoever.

Including make technically illegal deals with former enemies of the nation.

_But really nobody cares since it makes neighborly wars less likely._

…

Eventually we got roped into dinner. Mustafa's chefs are, I'm sorry to say, better than Ninya.

But then she's one person and he has a team, so it's no contest.

Plus she's cute and they're...I've never actually seen them so I can't make an objective judgment, but I'd imagine that she's cuter than all of them combined.

_We're trying to avoid getting killed by Ninya if she ever finds out…not that she will, of course._

…

"Concerning the matter you brought up last week…about that girl, Nowi." Mustafa said after dinner. "I believe I might have a lead."

I had told him (rather offhandedly) that Nowi was looking for an important family heirloom of hers…specifically, an impossibly round, green jewel.

_Or at least that's how Nowi described it._

I didn't actually think he would find anything. "What's up?"

"As you are aware…we Plegians often have unsavory contacts." Mustafa growls. "And it was brought to my attention by one of those contacts that a certain Feroxi noble has been dealing heavily with some of our slave traders of late."

I feel weird about talking Mustafa into regulating the slave trade in his territory. Like on one hand we gave support to the idea that slavery is ok, but on the other hand it lets Mustafa give slaves more official rights and greater protection under the code of law, so…

…Well, it's one more thing I mull over on my nightly walks. "That seems to be pretty normal."

_Nobles everywhere don't exactly shun the purchase of slaves…Chrom being an exception, but then he has a castle and no obligation to maintain it. For the record we don't own any slaves._

If memory serves the Shepherds raided a desert about two weeks back, no telling what they found though. I'm getting sidetracked though: ok, slaves, buying, possible lead, go.

"Indeed." Mustafa nods. "However, this particular noble has been quite vocal about his exotic collection of rarities…of both trinkets and people." I take it from the snarl in his voice that he's not exactly happy about this noble.

Hmm…exotic people, huh? "Well, it certainly is better than letting Nowi bash her head against the wall. Thanks, man."

_Non sequitur: most of the people in Mustafa's court don't like how informal we are with Mustafa._

Mustafa shrugs. "Concerning your other request, I have yet to be alerted of someone matching your description."

That 'someone' being, naturally, Noire.

I figured that if she was in danger of being kidnapped in her Paralogue, only to be saved by the player's timely entrance, then in this reality she's practically guaranteed to be enslaved and then sold. For a number of reasons I can't imagine slavery being good for her.

_Quirky nature aside, Noire is pretty…and stacked, which means she's probably going to be hard to secure if she is ever actually captured and sold. Well, hard to secure and rescue without resorting to violence._

I'm personally more worried about Loud!Noire getting Quiet!Noire into trouble that she can't get out of. I'm operating under the assumption that future me would have done _something _about Noire's lack of melee power in case something like that happens but…having a plan that isn't just "pray" is nice.

_For the record: what we told Mustafa to look out for is "girl with short hair, ample busom, a talent for bows, and the ability to switch from meek to insane at a moment's notice. He looked reasonably surprised at the last one._

I thought it was pretty accurate. "Well, thanks for keeping an eye out." I can't exactly run patrols myself since I don't have that kind of authority, but we're all trying.

_I find it amusing that we're not worried about anyone else, like, say, Severa._

Severa should have the common sense to avoid running into a fortress full of promoted enemies in the real world, since she's not running on the NPC AI anymore. Really, we only worry about Noire because all of her strength revolves around that amulet of hers.

…

[Back home for us, next day]

…

Well, Mustafa did say something about a Feroxi Noble who enjoys collecting stuff, so let's see if we can find something out.

…after we stop this current thing. "Nowi, Morgan, what are you doing?!"

Nowi releases the stranglehold she had on Morgan's neck. "He stole my cookies!"

_We heard something shatter a few minutes ago and came down to see this. It should be noted that Ninya is not in the house._

"I did not!" Morgan retorts. "You weren't supposed to have them!"

The two go into a staring contest again. Morgan's like…twelve…or something.

Point is Nowi's picking a logic fight with a child and losing. Nina is very strict about snacking.

More importantly though. I peer over Nowi's head to observe the vanquished cookie jar, and see… "Mag, stop that."

Magna withdraws his huge front claw from the table cookies in shame back out of the window.

_He's outside and is reaching into the house in a manner much like a cat…a large, scaly cat._

"Who broke the jar?" I ask.

"I did." Morgan says…very proudly, actually. "I was trying to keep it from Nowi and it slipped from my hands. I'm sorry."

I can't say he sounds apologetic, but he certainly doesn't seem to be lying.

"And I'm helping him clean up!" Nowi supplies happily.

_While we're not paying attention Magna sneaks a cookie away from the pile._

"Help by eating all the cookies." Morgan glares at her.

Nowi shrugs. "What? Don't get mad at me just because you haven't had any. Ninya's cookies are the best."

I feel like that last bit was an addition to…yeah.

_Nina had walked through the front door (behind the two of them) and had put a hand on Nowi's shoulder._

I think she's learning from Cherche.

Nowi utters the smallest, highest-pitched "sorry" I think I've ever heard as Ninya drags her out of my line of sight, into the kitchen area.

…

What an idiotic distraction.

"Uh…boss, are you going somewhere?" Morgan asks after he pays attention to my attire.

As in, I'm actually dressed in clean civilian clothing.

_Because you weren't cleanly dressed yesterday?_

I showed up in Mustafa's court wearing armor, so no, not really.

"I'm going to do a little digging around." I reply. "I finally have a lead on Nowi's thing that she's looking for."

Nowi, meanwhile, is in timeout, with Magna watching over her (and protected against bribes by Ninya promising him treats for doing a good job).

_Nowi has a surprisingly good track record for bribing Magna to do her bidding, unless treats or Minerva is involved._

"Really? She still doesn't have her Dragonstone?" Morgan says.

'Still', huh? "You want to come with me? I could use the help." I ask him.

Morgan's face just lights up. "Yes! I'll be glad to help! Just let me get my wHOA"

_Morgan tries to rush down the stairs into the basement armory but trip before he even gets to the staircase. He gets up and dusts himself off before charging down the stairs._

I suppose it's good that we didn't save Morgan just to lose him to a goddamn staircase.

_…_

Hmm…

Well, this is going to take us some time, so why not move on for a bit?

…

[If you say so]

.

.

.

{ === + === }

Author Note:

The writing. It feels weird when done with a dose of Tired.


	22. Interlude - 4

{ === + === }

[Ash]

Christmas tiiiime is here~~

Except it's not called Christmaaaaas~

I'm not quite sure what it's called but I'm sure it's…good.

It's been…what, two, three months now? Wow, time flies.

_Exposition: what have we been doing for the past few months?_

Uh…oh, right. Let's see.

About…two weeks ago the first batch of Pegasus Knights finally came, ten girls…all of them very cute and probably fresh, considering how nervous they looked getting off of their mounts.

The fact that it took this long for the first batch of Knights to arrive annoys me to no end, mind you, since right now everyone's taking time off for Not-Christmas and it's actually a religious holiday of some significance…which means we don't get to train the Knights.

On the plus side their families lives around here, so I get to keep them in my barracks instead of immediately losing them to vacation time.

_And that is incredibly ironic considering how we're not going to be around for the next four weeks._

Yeah. Vacation. All that fun stuff.

I'm heading back to Ylisstol for the holiday period (along with Cherche, Nowi, Nina and Morgan), mostly to reconnect with the Shepherds and get some more info…but mostly just to reconnect.

Anyways, everything's shut down because holiday, everyone gets to go home, so we do as well, fun stuff.

_In a more serious note…_

Getting to it, I'm getting to it…

First off, Morgan. Morgan doesn't have any memories of his past, much like the game Morgan. I'm hoping that if he sees Robin he will at least remember his birth mother. If he doesn't…well, then the problem becomes "What happened to Robin?" and I hope we'll find a reasonably happy answer. He does remember me and that's only a problem depending on how the question with Robin goes.

Second, Nowi. We're still searching for Nowi's Dragonstone but there hasn't been any leads apart from the one Mustafa gave us. I think it might be because I was too aggressive in my search and the noble went underground.

_To say that we had no leads is misleading. One of the nobles cleared out of his mansion in a huge fucking hurry and we raided it almost as soon as we heard him leave. The man left nothing of value in the mansion._

On the plus side I annexed the mansion he abandoned and converted it to the Pegasus Knight Barracks, so that's good for us.

_The mansion is very close to the Workshop and Drydocks as well, making it a doubly good purchase._

It's a testament to how much faith people have in me that nobody questioned the sudden departure of the noble and the immediate annexation of the mansion.

_Because he's 'evil' and we're 'good', obviously._

Anyways, Nowi's still nowhere near her stone and she's been pouting on and off for the past month. I say 'on and off' because it feels like she occasionally forgets to be angry.

No, seriously. She will play, laugh, have fun, and then suddenly try to be as sulky as possible, and it…doesn't really work. It's utterly adorable though.

Uh…sidetracked, sidetracked. Ok, what's next?

Third, the Workshop. While it's closed now (holidays) the workshop has expanded to use a better set of furnaces for better steel. I've also installed conveyor belts and I'm trying to get the master smiths to accept the values of the assembly line, especially when it comes to the components needed for our new equipment.

Which brings us to four: New equipment. Three new things have been made.

One is the Cruise Engines built for the fliers. They operate superficially like Jet Engines in that air is taken in and then pushed out of the back. The Ignition step is omitted since I don't have any jet fuel, but we do heat up the air as much as we can with fire spells.

I know that Arc Welding exists and it uses electricity and it's really good, but I don't know how it works even on a fundamental level so I can't use it…and it irritates me. That's neither here nor there though.

_If we knew how it works we'd make steel in greater quantities, which ties into…_

Two is the Modular Ship Armor. This hasn't been tested yet so I won't bother saying what it is, but the name should be pretty indicative of what it's supposed to do.

And, last but not least, number three, the one thing I absolutely needed to have finished and rolled out by the end of year one…the Siege Rail Gun.

_Drumroll please!_

Remember how good the Rifle was in the Plegian war?

The Siege Railgun is that, refined, scaled up, and mounted on a transportable platform…and also slated to be mounted aboard the ships. It fires stakes, instead of nails.

_If vampires existed then this would be the ultimate middle finger towards their regenerative properties._

We're only going to use this as a defensive weapon against hard targets (no shooting humans with it, since that constitutes a war crime) but as far as trials go…

The enemy warships will do a lot of things. Float will not be one of them.

_It does have its downsides: namely, the increased magical need forces us to consume small quantities of Spirit Dust. No way around it. Second, the operator has to be a fairly skilled mage, and mages are not very good at using weapons of extreme range…but we compensate for that by giving them a spotting archer with good eyes so we can hit at the maximum possible range. Third, the increase in magical energy requirement generates an absurd amount of extra heat, so it actually poses a danger to anybody standing near it._

_The Siege Gun's range is long than that of Bolting and Mire, in case you're wondering. The transportable platform needs to be towed into place via horses since I don't know how to make treads and wooden wagon wheels can't absorb the recoil of the shot well enough._

We created a compressed air cooling system for the gun barrel (where it gets really bad) to help vent the heat some, but really the gun doesn't have the best firing time, especially since, in order to get the cooling we need, the system has to be powered entirely by the mage firing the gun.

So basically we can fire about ten shots consecutively before the mage needs to go rest.

_Which is why we're looking into hiring more mages…but only as a safety measure, since the recoil of the gun will shatter the platform it's on and the bracing mechanisms that secure it to the ground in three or four hits. _

We had to pick splinters out of Morgan (who was doing the shooting) when he was testing the prototype (when it didn't have strong enough bracing) and the entire cannon base shattered beneath him.

Amazing how many things you can solve just by having a boatload of money. Amazing how many things you can't solve just by having a boatload of money too…

Speaking of boats…

The Drydocks have been finished and the first keel is laid. According to Mustafa construction on his side is moving smoothly as well. They're also off for holidays too, so no working overtime for either of us.

I think we're going to produce the main flagship and then four support ships tops, but if there's more time we would end up having more ships. Fingers crossed!

_Our Drydock is bigger than Mustafa's, so the flagship and one destroyer is being constructed here. Mustafa is responsible for the other three destroyers being made._

…

But yeah, overall, a productive few months.

Once we start training the Pegasus Knights (and if I get all forty of them) we'll be able to fight Walhart on even terms.

_As in, he has a trained, skilled army of a million…we have forty girls plus assorted supporting staff._

And it will be a gloriously one sided victory for us.

…

…

[So While Ash gets packed for his trip, let's cover some of the other places]

…

[Point of Interest 1: Lucina, Late October]

…

So as we might remember, last time we saw Lucina and company (Yarne, Laurent) they were tailing Kjelle in the hopes of making sure she didn't die.

Well…

The events of Kjelle's Paralogue started about five minutes ago.

Lucina and company picked up on the potential problem when one of their informants (read: a bandit they had accosted and…"persuaded") let them know about the not really sudden and expected betrayal, and thus once the battle started they were more than ready to help.

Slight problem: the three of them were outside the fortress, and Kjelle and her master were inside it.

_They're also nowhere near the fortress itself, but that can be remedied with a fair bit of walking._

"That doesn't look promising." Lucina grimaces as they rush up the hill to the closed gates of the fortress. "And to think we believed him."

'Him' being the bandit they shook down for information.

"I don't think any of us actually believed him." Yarne mutters.

The information they had gained suggested that the fortress opened its gates every so often to let its inhabitants in or out. By the sheer power of observation and common sense they figured out that it wasn't the case: the fortress hasn't opened its gates for the past three days, for reasons nobody seems to know.

"I don't like this one bit." Yarne growls as they approached the fortress. "We weren't exactly hiding. Why is there no welcoming party?"

"Perhaps something has happened within the fortress itself." Laurent mused. "Perhaps a mutiny among the ranks?"

Lucina shook her head. "You need to spend less time reading, Laurent…but I do agree that this is suspicious."

"Are we scaling the walls then?" Laurent asked as he reached into a pouch on his waist. "Or are we…?"

"Yarne." Lucina said.

_For the record: Still Redhead Lucina, though the coloring is fading some…so more Purplehead Lucina._

"Of course." Laurent sighed.

"On it." Yarne grinned as he pulled out two out two…long sticks that are painted menacingly red. He then attached the sticks onto two specialized nodes on the gauntlets he wore.

He then closed his eyes, took a deep breath, and focused.

As he gathered magical power, the sticks glow a brighter hue of red, and then transformed…revealing themselves to be pile bunkers as the sticks separated into two parts: the red outer shell and the steel inner stake.

"I still don't see why I can't use those." Laurent pointed out, gathering his own magical power and channeling it through a pair of Arcwind tomes.

"Because you'll break your bones on the next part." Yarne said (still concentrating). "Alright, say when!"

Lucina counted silently to three. "Go!"

With a savage roar, Yarne rammed his fists against the thick, heavy wooden fortress gate. With a soft hiss, the two bunkers drove themselves deep into the fortress gate after a loud crunch of broken wood and detached from Yarne's gauntlets.

"Breaking through!" Yarne declared as he pulled out his Beaststone while darting backwards, transforming into his massive, muscular demon bunny form. With a powerful kick of his hind legs he rams into the fortress gate, and a section of the gate breaks down due to a combination of sheer power and the bunkers compromising the strength of the door.

"Clearing house." Laurent reports as Giant Rabbit Yarne darts away from the woodchip-laden doorway. Laurent then proceeds to unleash the entirety of both Arcwind tomes into the fortress.

…

"I don't see why you want to be the one to make the breach, Laurent." Yarne asks (still in his bunny form) as he surveyed the sheer damage Laurent did to the entrance of the fortress.

"A change of pace would certainly be nice." Laurent comments as he adjusts his glasses. "Mind your step, there are probably many loose obstructions within the fortress's hallways."

The doorway, it should be mentioned, has now been torn down so completely that the only remainders of the wooden behemoth of no-entry is the steel hinges (and the tiny, tiny wood pieces still attached to said hinges.) The rest of the door is scattered in the entrance of the fortress in the form of sharp and deadly wooden chips.

_Think back to the map of Kjelle's Paralogue: the fortress has one major highway into it that branches off into several small paths. Laurent's breeching maneuver would've ensured the deaths of every enemy in the main highway and halfway into every side path._

"I wonder if we got Kjelle with that hit." Yarne wonders a little bit morbidly (and a little bit too late, all things considered).

"If she heard the stakes hit, she'll be fine." Lucina responds. "And if she didn't then she was too far away to be affected. Now come on, we have some searching to do."

"I don't like dark places." Yarne mutters.

"You're a rabbit." Laurent says with perfect deadpan. "And you're adapted to dark places."

"Taguel, if you will." Yarne corrects him. "And just because I'm used to it doesn't mean I'm any more comfortable with it. Scary things are in dark places, you know?"

The three of them continue down the main highway, noting with some satisfaction at how total the annihilation of the main highway is.

_Furniture strewn about, weapons laid on the floor…corpses everywhere._

Lucina drew her Parallel Falchion. "Laurent."

Laurent made a quick examination of the nearest corpse. "I wasn't responsible for his injuries…" He mutters. "Damnation. Yarne!"

"Three to our left, five to our right, two ahead of us, and seven behind us." Yarne reports quickly, his large ears twitching. "All Revenants."

"That explains why the fortress went silent." Lucina growls. "Advance, we'll break through!"

"DEEPER into the Risen infested fortress?!" Yarne wails but accompanies the group.

The Two Risen in front of them (General type) suddenly appear into view as the trio entered the large chamber at the center of the fortress. One of them immediately shoves a spear at Lucina's face.

Lucina, ducks underneath it and runs her Falchion straight into the General in response with one swift motion.

"What the…" She gasps as she swings the Falchion upwards, cutting the oversized General in half. "There's no response at all." She remarks and darts back.

The general she cleaved…reassembles itself, armor and all, in front of her.

"Of all the things that could've followed us here," Lucina groans. "It had to be the type threes."

Yarne, who had jumped into the other general, kicked it away with his powerful hind legs. "What do we do?!" He doesn't take his eyes off of his general, even though he kicked it into the wall with enough force to shatter skulls.

"Find Kjelle and let's get out of here!" Lucina commanded, rushing into close range combat against her general. "Laurent!"

"I'm on it." Laurent says as he pulls out another Arcwind tome. "Yarne, I'm providing relief."

"Gotcha." Yarne bounces back as his general gets up again. "Don't let it surprise you." He cautions before darting down the nearest set of staircases.

Laurent simply sneers in response, as the green magical wind wrapped itself around his fists.

…

"Oh Kjelle…? Where are you in this creepy, creepy place…?" Yarne half whispers, half yells as he, in his giant bunny form, quietly sneaks down the halls, searching all the while with his glowing eyes. "Please don't make me search the entire level, I don't think the two Ls can hold out that long…"

_But it's not that easy to find someone, so he keeps going._

…

Five minutes pass.

…

Lucina darts back from a swing from the general's spear pole. "Damn…this is endless." She quickly flips the Falchion and points it behind her, and then executes a quick back-step to impale it into a Risen Myrmidon behind her. "How are you holding out, Laurent?"

"Fair." Laurent says idly, blasting the general he's responsible with a burst of wind magic and sending it into the wall again. "However, it's not good logistically." He grumbles as another wind tome disintegrates in his hands. "I still have the Coup De Grace spells, if they're necessary."

"Not right now, I think." Lucina sidesteps a lunge from the general (it hits a Risen behind her) and then cuts the general in half across the waist. Then, with a roar, she swings in a massive arc behind her and cuts down three Risen behind her. "Damn, Yarne, you better hurry up!"

…

Two minutes pass.

…

"Oh, oh hell no." Yarne mumbles. "Kjelle, why are you bleeding out somewhere…?"

He had picked up the scent of her blood.

_Kjelle, despite (or perhaps because of) her armor, tends to get hurt the most._

"And now the Risen have definitely found me." Yarne growls and reverts to his human form, darting down the hallways and following Kjelle's scent.

So focused was he on following Kjelle's scent he almost ran head-first into a spear.

"Whoa!" Yarne's reflexes save him from being impaled through the forehead and he dart off to the side. "Wait wait wait wait! I'm an ally!"

The lady (who is probably Kjelle's teacher/master/whatever) hefts her spear at him. "I couldn't sense you coming. What are you?"

"I'm really light on my feet, ok? Sheesh." He turns to look at Kjelle. "Dammit. Hold on, Kjelle."

_Kjelle is slumped against a wall, unconscious._

"You don't look like a priest." The teacher remarks as the first Risen soldiers burst through the entrance. She stabs them all in their head with lightning speed and leaves their corpses to barricade the door…for as long as the corpses remain solid, anyways.

"Our Boss made sure every last one of us had Kits." Yarne said, inwardly grateful at not needing to strip Kjelle of her armor (the teacher did so herself) and hurriedly dressed and bandaged her wound. "Ok, it should be good now." He mutters, and then takes out something small, cylindrical, and shiny.

"What are you-" The teacher begins to ask.

Yarne doesn't respond, but simply ram the small object onto Kjelle's left forearm. A small needle then dispenses a dark blue liquid into Kjelle's veins.

_It's elixir, for those wondering._

Kjelle groans and gains consciousness almost immediately as Yarne pockets the small needle cylinder.

"How…Kjelle, are you alright?" The teacher asks before another noise took her attention; the Risen barricade had dissolved.

"Ugh…ow. Yarne?" Kjelle asks groggily.

_The teacher stabs a few more Risen and let them pile up at the doorway._

"Yeah, I'm here." Yarne says soothingly. "I'm no Brady though. How do you feel?"

"I can stand…ugh." Kjelle tries to stand but stumbles and holds a wall for support. "You used a needle on me?"

"Yeah. The dosage might've been too much." Yarne mumbles apologetically.

As a Taguel he's far more tolerant of the side effects of too much healing juice. Also each Future Child carried a pair of needle cylinders (which deliver a small healing dosage into the subject's body upon impact); one to use on others, and one to use on themselves. Being a Taguel, Yarne is the only one to carry a needle filled with a dosage of elixir and a needle with Vulnerary (Nah, despite being a Manakete, is too small and thus gets poisoning as well), everyone else carries two needles with one dose of Vulnerary each.

"Sorry, but let's get out of here before more of those things show up." Yarne said as he hoisted Kjelle in a cradle carry (princess carry, whichever) despite her protests. "Can you…?"

Kjelle's teacher simply smirks. "I'll cut a way out…I assume you're not here alone?"

…

Two minutes pass.

…

For the past two minutes Lucina and Laurent had been fighting a slowly but steadily losing battle against the apparently immortal Risen Generals and an almost endless swarm of lesser Risen, forcing the two to abandon their initial position of 'holding most of the room' to 'just barely defending the staircase entrance'.

_More precisely, Lucina has been carrying the brunt of the fighting with Laurent providing the occasional room clear to save on his spells. If videogame logic was in play Lucina should have gained ten levels out of just killing small fry by this point._

Yarne (while carrying Kjelle) pokes his head out of the top of the staircase, with Kjelle's teacher bringing up the rear.

In front of him, Lucina has just rushed one of the generals into a line of Risen, knocking them back with the weight of the hefty zombie armored soldier. Lucina spared a glance behind her.

"She's alive." Yarne reassured her. "More importantly, how do we get out?"

"Allow me." Laurent blasts the general he was facing into a clump of Risen. "Clearing a path to the fortress exit." He declares as he pulls out a small but very thick-looking tome.

Yarne makes an 'oh shit' face and ducks down into the staircase as Laurent gathers an incredible amount of magical power…and focuses it into the spellbook.

Lucina takes several swipes at the Risen trying to get close to Laurent in the precious few seconds he takes to ready his spell, and as soon as Laurent raises his arms she dives into the Staircase as well.

_Yarne, channeling his inner bunny strength, catches Lucina with Kjelle. Don't ask us how it works._

Lucina and Kjelle's "ow" of minor pain was drowned out by the roar of electrified wind above their heads as Laurent conjures a maelstrom of destructive magical power, scattering the Risen into the walls of the fortress (and sending quite a few into the Risen Generals, bowling them over under the sheer weight of the vapor zombie flesh).

The massive amounts of magical energy then stagnated and crystallized around Laurent, forming a cylindrical mesh of pure, utter power...a mesh that vibrated so quickly it seemed almost blurry.

And then Laurent lets go of his control, releasing the tight, net-like cylinder all around him.

The massively electrified magical net cylinder (_MEMNC?_) tore through the crowds of Risen, the magical power of the spell tearing into the inherently magical enemies and ripping the Risen to shreds. Were they not made of vapors the shreds would've been neat little squares of zombie flesh.

…

When the dust cleared, there were only pieces of Risen bodyparts clustered at the edges of the room, with a heavily panting Laurent still standing.

"Scares me every time." Yarne mutters as he pokes his head out of the staircase again, carrying both Kjelle and Lucina. "Can we go now?"

Lucina struggles to her feet and mutter an apology to Kjelle. "If they're really type three's then we need to move; Laurent, lean on me."

Laurent, with sweat pouring down his face, complies.

"Dear Naga. You're something else, mage boy." Kjelle's master (a tall, pretty woman with jet black hair) whistles. "You did all this yourself?"

"With the spellbooks crafted by my master, yes." Laurent replies.

"Less chatting, more walking." Lucina reminds him as the group makes their way out of the fortress.

…

…

"So you said something about them being 'Type three' Risen?" The teacher asks once the group has safely left the premises of the fortress to take shelter within a nearby abandoned farm house…a very run-down square hut made of bricks. "How can there be more than one type of Risen?"

"We categorize the Risen based on the observable differences in their recovery time and the amount of effort required to eliminate it." Laurent responds. "Type One Risen are the most common and can be destroyed through proper application of force."

"Type Two Risen can be killed by a clean hit to their core…a critical hit, if you will." Lucina says as she tends to Kjelle's wounds. "Alternatively, they can be destroyed by sheer brute force, but it takes a lot more power that way." She then addresses Kjelle. "How does it feel?"

"It feels like we should have Brady around." Kjelle grins, getting a good-natured bop on the head from Lucina in return. "Thank you, Lucina."

"And the Type three…?" Kjelle's teacher presses for an answer.

"Type Three Risen are…not Risen, in the strictest sense of the word." Laurent scowls. "It…Boss describes them as vapor puppets, as opposed to vapor zombies."

The Teacher has doubts about Laurent's Boss's sanity. "So that means…?"

"It means that a Type Three Risen has no core…more precisely, its core is under the control of someone else, somewhere else." Laurent says. "While a Type Three Risen is not as powerful as the other types—due to the lack of a centralized core and autonomous functionality—they more than make up for the lack of power with sheer impossible durability."

"Fortunately, a Type Three Risen needs a puppet master…and that puppet master is never far from the Risen itself." Lucina sighs. "But until the puppet master is removed from action a Type Three Risen will always attack…no matter how often you beat them down."

"Boss destroys them with no problem though." Yarne chips in. "And they don't rebuild themselves afterwards."

"He said it himself though…he doesn't actually kill them, just damage them with such overwhelming power that they can't reconstitute quickly enough." Kjelle says.

"Speaking of our dear Boss," Yarne pulls out a thin, rapier-like weapon. "Do you think the Boss here could get these to work?"

"I don't think so…?" Lucina scratches her head, and then frowns at the red dye on her fingers. "Then again, he seems to be more…relaxed, than the Boss."

"I don't think it's possible for anyone to be less relaxed than Boss." Kjelle rubs her shoulders. "You didn't see my armor down there, did you?" She asks Yarne.

"I saw what was left of it." Yarne replies. "You're going to have to get a new set made."

"Dammit." Kjelle sighs. "Lucinaaaaa—" She then says in the sweetest voice possible.

"I'm not paying for the entire thing this time." Lucina growls. "Get Inigo to do it."

Laurent chuckles at that one.

"Kjelle, what do you plan to do now?" Her teacher asks.

Kjelle stands a little shakily. "Uh…if possible, I would like to accompany my friends on their…" She glances at Lucina.

"We're going after Owain next…a friend of ours." Lucina responds. "It would certainly be helpful if you could travel with us." She bows to the teacher.

"I'll think about it." The teacher smiles slightly.

…

"So why Owain and not Cynthia?" Yarne mutters to Lucina as they get underway again.

"I haven't heard any rumors resembling Cynthia…only Owain, and all of it in Valm, unfortunately." Lucina responds, looking a bit worried.

Yarne frowns. "She'll be fine…she's your sister, you know?" He reassures her.

"I'm worried about her penchant for heroism getting her into…well." Lucina sighs. "She's not much good off of her Pegasus despite Ash's best efforts to address the problem…and by god is she naïve when it comes to food."

"I'd say Owain is worse in that respect." Yarne mutters.

…

[Speaking of Owain]

…

Currently (during Lucina's event) Owain was spending his time idling in an inn in a small Valm village.

_Valmese? Would they be called Valmese? Valmerian?_

Idling with some food for a few minutes before his partner in crime showed up rubbing his face with a pained expression.

"How many is that now?" Owain asks with a smirk as his partner in crime sat down across from him.

"Don't even start." Inigo grumbles, still rubbing his face.

Owain has been keeping count, actually: it was the fifth time Inigo has been rejected in the past two days. Owain idly wonders if Inigo was losing his touch, given how few attempts he made.

The two had been spending time travelling around Valm as mercenaries, fighting off bandits harassing the common people. While it technically fortified Valm's position on the continent, it did also swing public opinion in their favor (namely, in Owain's bombastic favor) so should Owain appear on, say, the side of a possible future invader, it would bring the support of the people with them.

For now though? The two are just having lunch…while a few girls bat eyelashes at Owain, hoping to get his attention.

No, Inigo's not jealous at all, why would you think such a thing?

…

[Current Time, Ash]

…

Due to the usage of the cruise engines, it took Ash and Cherche only four days to carry Nina, Nowi, and Morgan back to Ylisstol.

The cruise engines did have a downside: Their weight made it almost impossible for the two Wyverns to do vertical takeoffs (they could jump but couldn't get the flight speed necessary to stay in the air) and thus were forced to run on the ground to gather speed before taking off.

When Ash brought this up Nowi took it as an offense to her insignificant weight for some reason and sulked for the second half of the trip. She even swapped seats with Nina (who was sitting in front of Ash) as a penalty against Ash. He wasn't quite sure how "I'm going to sit in front of you" is considered a type of punishment.

When Ash brought _that _up…well, Nowi was already refusing to speak to him so there wasn't really anything she could do about it, so while she tried her best to ignore him he just fiddled with her hair at every available opportunity.

_All things considered Nowi wasn't very unhappy about the whole situation, so…nobody knows what's going on inside her head._

_…_

Really I think she was just bored, since the past few days (before we left) the house was literally empty…Nina and I were busy converting the annexed mansion into a barracks (we also hired a bunch of people to help us) and so were never home. Cherche was gone making sure we had enough Wyverns and Pegasus replacements if we ever lost any in combat.

Also, something I never knew: it's a major faux pas to suggest to a Pegasus Knight that losing their mounts is a possibility.

Uh…where was I? Oh, right. Morgan buried himself in the mansion's library day in and day out, so Nowi had nobody to play with.

I mean, she came around to the mansion often enough but everyone was busy, y'know?

_She does play with the local kids, but it's more than a bit depressing to go home to an empty house._

Yeah. We spent a lot of time sleeping in the mansion to save time.

…Which is kind of why I played with Nowi while we flew. It sucks seeing her sad, y'know?

_Nowi is smart though, so she could've just have been playing us for the past week._

Yeah, but then again it's Nowi and she doesn't have a disposition to evil, unlike us.

…

…

Anyways, we do a fly-by of Castle Ylisstol and land in one of the larger courtyards they use for cavalier training.

There's no snow here, which is nice, because…

_"FINALLY! NO SNOW!" Nowi yells happily as she leaps from her seat on top of Magna._

We've been flying through snow on and off for the entire trip. I need to invent goggles.

Also my map is soggy.

_We peel the map we used to find our way across the continent off of Magna's back._

"Hi! STAHL!" Nowi screams with delight and bum rushes the man in question.

He's…armored, so she just kind of bounces off. Not that it deterred Hugmonster Nowi in any way though.

"Nowi! What a pleasant surprise!" Stahl responds equally happily (though with less childish enthusiasm) and has no issues returning her hug. "Robin said you guys would be here three days from now!" His surprise makes me grin.

"We had a little help…that reminds me." I snap my fingers and unhook the cruise engines from Magna (Cherche does the same for Minerva). "There we go…how does yours look, Cherche?"

Cherche shakes her slightly burned hand. "It's a little hot, but it seems to be in working order."

"Those things are…?" Stahl asks with hesitation…but is robbed of an answer when…

_A yellow blur rushes from the castle and tackles Nowi while screaming at the top of her lungs. Nowi returns the favor with gusto._

…when Lissa is reunited with her favorite playing mate. My ears. Ow.

"I take it this reunion has been long anticipated." I smile sheepishly. "Sorry I've kept her for so long, Lisse."

"But of course." Maribelle snaps as she walks down the staircase…with comparatively more elegance than the Princess of Ylisse who's rolling in the grass with Nowi. "We've all missed you, all of you…" Her gaze falls to Nina and the air around her visibly cools.

_If she actually has feelings for us things just got really bad._

"And who might you be?" She asks in the most terrifyingly icy tone possible.

Nipping this shit in the bud RIGHT now. "Maribelle, this is Nina, my maid…Nina, this is Maribelle, an Ylissean Noble."

"You took your _maid _with you?" Maribelle seethes as Nina gives her a polite bow.

I glare at Maribelle. "Well…yeah. She's family."

_Nina gives no fucks about what Maribelle thinks of her. The fact that I'm unmarried and live with three women (one of which looks like a child) is grounds for a storm of nasty rumors…well, given my reputation lately they've more or less stopped by now (which is a problem in of itself) but Nina, by virtue of being the least likely person to retaliate, got the worst of it._

Which was kind of why Magna hung out around the house on his spare time, actually; nobody wants to pick on a maid being guarded by a Wyvern. I only found out that Magna hung around Nina a lot when Nowi pointed it out to me though.

_We just thought he really liked her sweets…we really like her sweets. She's a damn good baker._

In any case, Maribelle caught my glare and (mercifully) understood that it was a topic that should be dropped with all haste, so she does. "It's been a while, Lady Cherche; I'm glad to see you well." She says as a change of topic, giving a small, polite curtesy to Cherche.

_Her face still shows hints of her disapproval though._

Cherche returns the curtesy with a smile. "Indeed it has. It's certainly wonderful to be back in Castle Ylisstol after our months of absence."

"Less polite talk, more hugging!" Lissa…wow. Lissa, with grass stains all over her yellow dress, demands.

"Yeah!" Nowi (in grass-stained sensible winter clothing) agrees.

Both of them rope Cherche, Nina, and Maribelle into a group hug.

_Maribelle, it should be mentioned, twitched a little bit when she bumped against Nina._

I guess the aristocracy thing doesn't die easily, does it?

_Stahl, shrugging, starts to chat with Morgan, who responds with Nowi-levels of enthusiasm._

…

…

In short order (after we managed to pry Lissa loose from everyone else) we were introduced to the rest of the normal cast.

Let's see…

Chrom's getting stronger still, nothing new about that.

Sumia's real big now. Baby Lucina is on the way.

Robin is…Robin? I don't know what I can say about her. She seems to be more focused than before?

_Also, Morgan showed no immediate reaction to Robin, and vice versa._

Stahl has been promoted into a Heavy Knight…was that what they were called?

_Great Knight, not Heavy Knight._

So he's practically Fredrick's right hand man in terms of command right now.

Sully is a Paladin, and serves as the commander of the Rapid Reaction Cavalry Force, established before the Ylisse-Plegia war. The Force itself is pretty famous now too, apparently. Sully's a bit of a famous woman now, much to her chagrin.

Before I forget. Kellam! Kellam has been assisting in Miriel in her research. I think that's pretty much their support, depending on exactly what Miriel is researching.

Miriel is researching.

Like I wish I had more to say about it but fuck she's tight lipped about exactly what's being researched and nobody will tell me. I can't actually find Kellam so that's not even an option.

Uh…next, next.

I don't know where Virion is. Nobody knows where he is.

I don't know where Gaius is. Ditto as above.

Donnel went back to his village to rebuild it (with the help of the Shepherds) and established a local militia. He's getting quite good when it comes to the usage of every weapon.

Ricken and Maribelle have a thing going on? I dunno. Apparently Ricken has been travelling with her a lot and the number one gossip is that they're dating.

Maribelle has been doing whatever she's doing. She wouldn't tell me and nobody wants to talk about it…except Lissa. Maribelle has been travelling per her roles as a troubadour, assisting the people and healing the sick. She's a Valkyrie now.

Lissa…wouldn't tell me what's going on, and every attempt to obtain information was foiled by Maribelle's parasol. I think I heard something about a hammer though.

Panne went to do her own thing after a short stint as a mercenary along with Gregor and Donnel.

Gregor helped Donnel train militia. I think? I got two stories for him, and the second one involved him drinking heavily and getting arrested, so I'm not sure.

_The second half of the Gregor story involved a jail break, more alcohol, and shirtless Gregor. We're not entirely sure we want to know the full story, as the mental image of shirtless Gregor with a heavy Russian accent fighting his way out of jail with his bare hands and a bottle of vodka is good enough._

Vaike is Vaike. Apparently he's been hanging out around Lissa a lot. Probably has something to do with the hammer thing mentioned earlier.

Libra isn't here. I don't know, and I honestly don't really care…sorry Libra, but my inherent Fire Emblem prejudice against pre-promoted characters mean you will always be a benchwarmer for me.

Tharja stalks Robin. Apparently some Plegian-hating noble tried to start a rumor about Tharja being…what, a prostitute? He died mysteriously a few days later. That didn't necessarily quell the rumors, but then again Tharja didn't seem to give a fuck anyways, so eh?

_Cue shrug of confusion._

Fredrick is Fredrick. He's also engaged to Cordelia! Every person I've asked about how that happened just grinned and ignored me, so I assume it was at least good-funny, not at-their-expense-funny. Otherwise he's still one of the most top ranking commanders in the Ylissean army.

Cordelia's still…uh…what's her face, Phila. She's still Phila's second in command of the Ylissean air force, and her skill is supposed to be way better than it was during the war…a good opportunity to learn if I can get a few hours in the air.

Lon'qu is practically Basilio's successor now; he came down to Ylisstol from the Long Fort for the winter holidays with his new wife Olivia!

_Squee~_

Apparently they got married very recently. Since the travel distance between the Long Fort and Ylisstol is shorter (and less snow-filled) than Long Fort and My Port City, so that explains why I only found out now.

I wonder if that means there's an Inigo in her tummy right now…for obvious reasons I'm not going to ask that out loud.

Olivia's still a dancer and still terrifyingly attractive and sparkly. She's also gotten better…WAY better, with a sword. The two of them are pretty much a battle couple now.

…

Emmeryn's still nice and healthy and friendly as ever. She's consolidated her power as well apparently, but I haven't seen any signs of difference.

_There's one sign of difference: there're a lot more muttering in her court now._

Phila's also alive and well, and is actively training the trainees, to nobody's surprise.

Nino's done a lot of learning in Ylisse and is one of the most well-educated mages in the city.

_She's also been courted a lot by the nobles of the city…but the most interesting development is her apparently lack of enthusiasm as of late._

I've asked around and it seems like she's looking into teleportation a lot…so I guess she's trying to go home, and whatever methods she's found so far are far from promising.

Finally, Amelia…

Amelia has been withdrawn from the Ylissean air force per the wishes of her parents. Nobody knows why. Icing on the cake? I'm not allowed visitation rights to their estate. Rumors suggest that since her family has connections with some of the more powerful anti-Emmeryn factions Amelia was married off for political purposes.

This pisses me off to no end, since I just lost what would've been my Lieutenant because of politics.

_Not really 'just'. Apparently all this happened during the summer._

Their Estate is ugly too.

_We're not salty. Nope. Not even a little bit. Nuh-uh._

…

All that info was collected over a few days, mind…a few days that kind of gave me a reputation as being Virion-like in nature.

…

[At One Dinner]

…

So there is a major party being prepared (I'm helping!) and we're having dinner in the castle's mess hall when I see someone very, very interesting slink around in the background of the hall.

_Does she always look that angry?_

"Hey." I elbow Sully (sitting next to me). "Who's that girl over there?"

"Who?" She follows my gaze. "Oh, her? She's a mercenary…Some guy who knew you sent her here with a letter of recommendation." She then shoots me a glance of alarm. "You didn't know?"

_We follow her with our eyes…and we don't think she noticed._

Someone who knew me? Must be Hawk. "I know who you're talking about. 'Scuse me."

_We get up to chase after the girl._

"Skirt chaser." Sully mutters and resumes demolishing her food.

…

So how do I get her attention without fucking everything up?

_She's making her way out of the room._

Also, she has to be dying that hair…though I hope she isn't.

Uh…wow, this is oddly hard.

Wait, no it isn't! Asshole mode go!

_We've followed her just out of the mess hall now._

"Hey! Twin-tails! Got a minute?"

_The girl flinches visibly and stops in her tracks._

"I'd appreciate it if you addressed me by name, _sir._" Severa growls as she whips around…that is a lot of anger concentrated on her face.

_Severa's eyes widen as she realize just exactly who she's talking to._

I hope she knows why I didn't call her by name. "Well, it certainly would help to know your name first." I grin.

"Uh…it's…" Severa blushes. "Luna. My name is Luna." She finally (and adorably!) mumbles.

_She's fidgeting and a little bit red in the face and everything._

"Well, then, uh, 'Luna'." I can't help but think 'Sailor Moon' with that name and it's making everything a hundred times less serious than it should be. "Can I have a minute?"

Severa recovers her composure well enough to go into tsun mode again. "Hmph. If we must."

_We duck into a side room and I shut the door behind her._

Severa checks to make sure we're not overheard (I think) and snaps a salute. "Boss, it's good to see you again. Even if you don't…"

Oh my god she's smiling and it's so cute eeee~~!

_We squee because Severa has always been our daughter throughout every playthrough. It's firmly established within my head that Chrom-Sumia-Lucina-Cynthia is one family, and MyUnit-Cordelia-Morgan-Severa is the other family._

"Uh…are you feeling ok, sir?" Severa trails off when she notices me grinning like an idiot.

"I'm perfectly fine." I don't stop grinning. "It's just that you're adorable and deserving of hugs."

Severa's eyebrow goes up…which means that future me does this all the time? "It's certainly reassuring to know that this part of you didn't change throughout the years." She sighs.

Huh.

_That brought us back to earth._

"Alright, exposition time." I sit down on a chair…this used to be an office, I think. Severa leans against the table. "Tell me what the future me is like from your viewpoint."

She thinks for a minute. "Well, for starters…"

_For starters, she's not at all nervous around us, which is certainly a good sign, compared to how Lucina nearly killed us on our first meeting._

…

[Exposition]

…

Hmm…

Alright, so let's sum this up.

Future!Me played favorites among the future children…no real surprises there. Severa was (naturally) near the top of the list.

Future!Me spent quite a lot of time with the future children as well. This seems to contradict the essence of Lucina's story (her story implies that future me was very work-oriented and didn't spend much time for other details).

_Rebuttal: Lucina, being comparatively older than the rest of the kids, might have been left to her own devices on the assumption that she was more mature and thus more capable._

Makes sense…I was left alone to my own devices a lot as a little kid too…then again, might have just been a culture thing.

Moving on.

Future!Me was hell-bent on technological advances, which is uncomfortably in-line with what I'm doing now.

Future!Me had a callous disregard for anyone he didn't consider useful. This part worries me, because quite literally I will forget someone after five minutes if they're not important in some way.

Future!Me sent all of the Future Children back with technology, designed to be used by the kids…with the ones I devoted more attention to getting better stuff.

Thank you, future me? I hope you sent maintenance manuals.

Severa's future gear is…a secret. She's not going to show me.

_Imagine if we gave her a chastity belt. Knowing us it would be a chastity belt that can shoot bullets._

Future!Me is incredibly paranoid. I'm worried about this one.

_See?_

…Missing from the story is how the situation in the future world got bad enough that the kids needed to be sent back through time. Severa knows that the situation was bad (she wouldn't be here if it wasn't) but she doesn't know how or why it got that way.

Future!Me did die at some point (Severa attended the funeral) but I don't know where it fits on the timeline of Future!Me becoming an Iron-fisted tyrant.

_If we throw all the data together then it's fair to assume that, as far as Severa is concerned, Future!Ash's death was recent…and due to his death the empire that he built collapsed, and somehow the world got worse?_

The major question mark now is…did I kill Grima in the future? I remember Lucina saying that I did.

_Before you go back a few chapters to check…no, she didn't actually say that. We planned to kill Grima. Memory is an imperfect thing._

Well…if shit hit the fan hard enough for the kids to time travel then obviously the answer would be 'no', but then again it feels like Severa is omitting details for whatever reason.

Hmm.

…

I thank Severa and we get ready to leave…because honestly she's supremely attractive and I imagine that if anyone saw the two of us (mainly Severa) emerging from a small, secluded room looking happy and satisfied the rumors will fly.

And if that's the case, then whenever Cordelia finds out about Severa my head will fly.

_Among other things._

Severa at least had the good graces to rearrange her face into an expression of mild inconvenience before she left.

_I'm sure that will cause different rumors._

"Boo."

I freeze.

Tharja pokes her head into the room. "Look what we have here…?"

She…uh.

Stranger danger! Stranger danger!

_You're like 25 now!_

Don't fucking care! Stranger danger!

_Tharja has a very predatory look on her face as she slips into this room._

"Well now…aren't you the interesting one?" She smiles...

I mean, she's hot in her stripperific outfit and everything but right now everything about this situation screams danger. Also she feels terrifyingly similar to a snake.

"Why do you feel so familiar to me, boy…?" _Tharja whispers as she slowly advances on us._

_We, it should be mentioned, have backed away into the opposite wall._

I regret picking such a small room!

.

.

.

"Ah…boring." Tharja huffs, and immediately the oppressively heavy atmosphere dissipate. "So…who are you?" She asks me.

_Despite how tenuous our situation feels we cannot help but stare at Tharja._

I take a quick, deep breath. "I'm Ash. Uh…what the hell were you trying to do?"

"I saw you talk to little miss angry back there and I got curious." Tharja's smile is very…off-putting, when you actually see it up close. "Judging by how this place smells…you two were very, very boring."

_She finishes her sentence with a very conspicuous squeeze of her breasts._

I have to admit at this point it's more confusing than alluring. "Well…I'm not that kind of person. Why are you here, though? Just curious?"

She…dark giggles? Is that even a real thing? It's not loud enough to be a cackle and it sure as hell isn't innocent enough to be a regular giggle, so…

Tharja…ok, you know what? Fuck it. Tharja dark-smiles. "You feel like Robin, Ash."

I what now?

"I take it you're just as power-hungry and…driven, as she is." Tharja continues. "Have you looked into dark magic yet?"

Is she saying what I think she's saying? "No, I haven't had the time."

"Pity. You can learn a lot about magic if tap into the ancient arts." Tharja…uh, I guess that would be a seductive gaze she just tossed at me… "Interesting. I'll be keeping an eye on you, Ash."

…

She left.

…

Ok…whew.

Let me just…take a few deep breathes here and…

Uh. Let me get the hell out of this room and take a few deep breathes…

_Tharja wears some very…intoxicating…perfume…or would it be incense?_

I hope it doesn't cling to my clothes.

_Inhale…exhale._

Ok. Let's take a minute.

Tharja is apparently capable of some kind of magical environment control. Assuming that she doesn't know mind control, she…ugh.

_She has a very attractive body and knows how to use it to get undivided attention…plus she can possibly use magic to assist her in some way._

Thank you.

I can see why the unfortunate noble tried to discredit her…with manipulative abilities like that she'd be very, very good at finding secrets.

…

So what did she mean by me being similar to Robin?

_Maybe we're also a potential vessel for Grima?_

Considering the sheer amount of eugenics needed to make Robin…while it would be amusing to just shit on possibly centuries of Grimleal hard work through sheer dumb luck, I don't think that's actually a possibility.

_Fact: we're extremely, critically weak against dark magic._

…So even if I don't know what the hell she's talking about, I should start dabbling in the books to see what I can learn, I guess?

It's really hard to get even a Flux tome in Ferox or Ylisse though. Nevermind any kind of punishment by law, dark magic is just frowned upon in general, and most researches done into it would be purely theoretical in nature.

Hmm…might be a bit tricky.

_Don't forget about the other thing you came for._

Yeah, yeah…

.

.

.

{ === + === }

Author Notes: End of Year One.

Well, almost.

=Edit Edit Edit=

The great "Death To Original Naming" has made art for Ash's...uh...Chastity Belt That Shoot Bullets.

asiano1(insert dot)deviantart(insert dot)com/art/Fire-Emblem-the-Self-Insert-Number-A-Bajillion-1-545876057

asiano1(insert dot)deviantart(insert dot)com/art/Fire-Emblem-the-Self-Insert-Number-A-Bajillion-2-545876352

asiano1(insert dot)deviantart(insert dot)com/art/Fire-Emblem-the-Self-Insert-Number-A-Bajillion-3-545876548

Give him/her/it hugs and cookies for the fantastic work. :3

Also Art!Ash is way more attractive than Actual!Ash.


	23. Interlude - 5

{ === + === }

"You've certainly improved, Ash."

Cordelia smiles upon me as I lay flat on my back on the ground, winded.

"Doesn't look like that improvement amounted for much, though." I wheeze.

_Magna growls and snips at Cordelia's Pegasus, who boffs him on the head with her giant feathery wing._

"Every little bit counts." Cordelia extends a hand, and we take it and stand up.

_So that's five rounds total, with us losing every round?_

Just about, yeah. Ow.

"I am deeply impressed at the…what did you call them? The extra equipment you created for your Wyvern." She continues. "Although I wonder about its practical application during heated battle."

"Yeah, well…" I glance at Magna's cruise engines. "They could use a little more adjustment."

_The Cruise Engines are built for linear speed with extra components for agility. During match 4 of 5 the extra components suffered too much stress and failed._

Even with the extra agility Cordelia flew in circles around our head…but it did let us survive for an extra fifteen seconds or so per round, so it wasn't an entirely wasted effort.

"Forgive for saying as such, Sir Ash." Phila coughs. "But I did not expect you to last as long as you did."

Yeah, yeah… "Makes the two of us. Magna! Stop bothering her."

_Magna grumbles and trots over to us. Cordelia's Pegasus lets out a victory-whinny._

Over on the sidelines we could see a few of the Shepherds watching.

_Good thing it wasn't snowy today. Just cold and sunny._

I think they were making bets.

Judging by how nobody seemed angry I'm going to assume that nobody bet on me winning.

_We unhook the Cruise Engines from Magna and he leads himself to the stables. We carry the Cruise Engines to the sidelines while Cherche goes up for some rounds against Cordelia._

I love both of them but I seriously hope Cherche kicks Cordelia's ass.

No, we're not salty about losing so one-sidedly at all.

"Nice going, Ash. You did better than me, at least." Robin consoles me with a smirk. "Well, better than my first time in the air anyways."

"Yeah, well…" I grumble as I pop open the Cruise Engine. "Oh fuck that's hot." Ow ow ow my hand.

_It's steaming._

"Wow, what happened to it?" Lissa asks.

Hmm. "Looks like one of the side port struts snapped off." Two of the spell papers are touching.

Let's…remove that, before it explodes on our faces.

_We carry wooden tweezers just for the purpose of disarming spell paper._

"So this thing made you go superfast, huh?" Lissa wonders as she looks to the skies.

"Yep. Rapid Acceleration and Deceleration Engine." I follow her gaze.

_RAD Engine. We have the best naming sense._

"I want to fly too, but Chrom won't let me." Lissa sulks as we watch Cherche beat Cordelia senseless in the sky.

_What's actually happening: Cherche is using a lot of aggressive maneuvers, but Cordelia's defensive maneuvers are keeping Cherche's axe from finding a mark._

"It's less a matter of not letting you, Lisse." Chrom interjects. "But uh…if you fly someone will have to protect you."

"Meanie." Lissa sticks her tongue at her older brother. "I can handle myself in a fight now, you know."

Robin rolls her eyes.

"It's true!" Lissa demands. "Ash!"

Wait what

"I am _not _acting as your battle dummy for the sake of showing off." I frown.

Lissa has, somehow, learned about being demanding from both Maribelle and Vaike. "I didn't say you had a choice."

I sigh. "Chrom?"

"She's now no longer my problem." Chrom shrugs…the little fucker. "Why don't you entertain her a little?"

"I swear to god Chrom." I glare at him and stand up.

He just grins and refuses to say anything in return.

"Ready or not here I come!" Lissa yells before I HAD A WAIT HOLD IT YOU CRAZY LITTLE

_Lissa, blessfully, was using a training axe (imagine a giant mallet made of wood with a lot of cotton over the mallet part)._

I scramble out of the way before she can take my head off.

"Stop moving!" Lissa uses the momentum of the missed swing to bring the hammer down onto my head.

_We dodge sideways and her hammer makes a very noticeable dent in the ground._

"She's Chrom's sister, alright." I mutter and tap my pocket spellbook.

_We then extend out hand all Jedi-like towards the nearest training sword (a long piece of wood with cotton over it) and it flies into our hand._

Lissa wrestles her training axe away from the ground. "Alright, let's try that again."

Before waiting for any kind of response she dashes in with…really?

_Lissa tries an uppercut swing with the oversized mallet and we back away safely out of reach._

Well, if you insist.

_We step in for a jab._

Lissa uses the momentum of the upward swing to bring the axe around in a massive (flat) sweeping arc across our chest.

_We block it with the sword, but the impact sends us flying._

"If that had been a real axe, you'd be dead, Ash!" Lissa laughs. She is _really _cheerful about all of this.

"Don't hold back against my little sis!" Chrom calls out.

"You meanie!" Lissa calls back.

Why am I doing this again?

_We take a deep breath and tap our pocket spellbook again._

…

[3rd Person Camera]

…

Lissa blinks in surprise as Ash closes the distance between them at a blink of an eye.

"Bop." Ash says lightly as he taps Lissa on her head with his training sword.

Lissa catches on and swings wildly, only to find Ash suddenly far away again. "That's cheating! You're using magic!" She cries.

"This is a 'real' battle, Lisse." Ash grins.

Lissa grimaces. "Bleh. You're no fun." She twirls the training axe/hammer thing over her head at a worrying speed.

Ash grins like a fucking moron, taps a different pocket spellbook, and then snaps his fingers.

"Whoa!" Lissa suddenly loses her balance as the hammer jerks to a stop and falls onto her head with a soft "bop".

"Magic is cheating." Lissa grumbles as she picks up her training hammer again.

_It's not an axe anymore?_

"You being able to spin something that heavy over your head is cheating." Ash shrugs.

"I'll show you cheating." Lissa growls, spinning her small body to bring out the momentum needed to swing the hammer at lethal speeds.

"I guess I can't wall that one." Ash observes. "Alright, let's do this."

…

[A few minutes later]

…

Lissa lie flat on the ground, exhausted. "You're no fun to play against at all!" She groans.

"Well, I make do." I extend a hand for Lissa and she grabs it.

_She hops to her feet with no real issue, and we walk back to the observation area together._

"So…" Chrom sounds SUPER smug.

"I lost. Shush, big bro." Lissa snaps, sits, folds her arms, and sulks.

Miriel stares at us. "That magic you used…what was it?"

I used one new trick in the fight. "Which one?" Not gonna make it easier for her tho'.

"The one where it looked like you teleported. I didn't know you could teleport." Robin says. "You probably can't, right?"

"Last I checked I haven't figured it out." I shrug. "This is wind based." I tap my pocket spellbook again.

_Allow us to explain!_

Please.

_This is a prototype spell that we're experimenting with. It creates a short-ranged vacuum-like environment between us and the target, and then either throws us into the target or throws the target into us. Natural limitation of the spell: we cannot change the intent of the spell mid-cast (if we're grabbing, we're grabbing. We can't push). This is because the spell takes a truckload of magical power to cast._

It's…very expensive and very situational, so it's not too useful in a heated battle.

_The reason why it's expensive is because of the vacuum-like environment we try to create…by forcibly pushing air out of the path of approach with a high-powered blast of magic. By virtue of physics the vacuum will try to fill up with whatever is closest, and via magical power we make sure that the thing filling the vacuum is either us or what we're trying to fetch._

"I see." Miriel furiously writes into a notebook. "Fascinating application of wind magic I dare say, even if it is only situationally useful."

"Situationally useful is the best kind of useful." I grin.

_We used it to nab an orange from a basket sitting near Sumia as a demonstration. Sumia's hair gets blown everywhere by the wind we generate._

"I imagine you've made quite a lot of progress in your magical prowess in the past year…beyond the cute little tricks, that is." Maribelle taunts us.

_She's also giving Lissa the cuddliest hug. Lissa is so bitter about losing she's not complaining about the hug at all._

I shake my head. "Nah…still tricks. Tricks that I've figured out how to use in different ways, but tricks nonetheless."

"Tricks good enough to beat Lissa." Chrom adds lightly.

Lissa growls like an annoyed kitten.

_Maribelle cuddles harder._

…

Cordelia and Cherche eventually finished their match in the air. According to both parties, it was a fairly even match. I'll pretend that Cherche doesn't look mildly annoyed at all.

…

[Later that day]

…

_I like how we're transitioning as if something interesting happened later in the day._

Yeah…apart from preparation for the grant party nothing overly interesting happened. I mean, Nowi and Lissa raided the pantry and got chased out by the head chef, but other than that…

_Bonus points: Nowi stole a whole fish. We think it might have been a tiger shark due to its size, but Ylisse's seaside isn't known for sharks._

She accidentally smacked Robin in the face with it too.

…

I'm talking as if Nowi somehow got rid of the large fish, but no. She still has it.

She somehow roped Morgan and Ricken into grilling the fish with magic.

It's on fire now.

_We are not sure if we are watching a fish funeral pyre or an open-air BBQ._

…

…

[Elsewhere in the Castle]

…

Severa attracts attention.

"Like I said, I'm not interested, now excuse me." Severa huffs.

"Oh come now, don't be so cold…" The young nobleman trying to talk her up said as sweetly as he could manage. Considering how this conversation has lasted for fifteen minutes, his patience has long since evaporated.

Severa's response is to simply shoot him a scathing look. "You are incredibly shallow for a supposed noble."

"All I ask is for your company…it's not much at all, I daresay." The young man bows.

Severa stares coldly at him for another moment. "What do you really want?"

"Why, as I've said—"

"Enough." Severa cuts him off. "I know your reputation. Out with it."

The…

_I really want to call him Jeff for some reason._

The young Noble's face changes slightly from politeness to…a certain level of confidence. "Oh? Then you must be aware of the rumors surrounding you as well, Lady Luna."

Severa narrows her eyes. "I care little for courtly rumors." The rumors in question were about her…uncanny, resemblance to a certain Cordelia. To clarify, the rumors were not targeting Cordelia or Severa, but rather Cordelia's family (who were supporters of Emmeryn) in order to attempt to discredit them.

"Oh really? Then how about…oh…" the young man strokes his chin for effect. "Sir Ash?"

Severa's poker face of annoyed anger cracked just a tiny bit, enough for the noble to pick it up.

"So he does have connections in Plegia after all…" The man continues. "…maybe the rumors concerning his status as a potential double agent for the Grimleal aren't off the mark either."

"You're an idiot." Severa deadpans.

The noble ignores the jab. "Now, I imagine that Emmeryn thinks highly of him…and so does Chrom…but if, _if, _on the off chance that he's a Grimleal agent, he will need to be…taken care of. But of course we can't do that, since he's so well regarded." The young man suddenly turns to face Severa, having paced around her while talking. "But you! Your origins are far too obscure."

Severa resisted the urge to draw her knife.

The noble was well aware that he was a breath away from having his throat slashed, but didn't show it. "I don't think I need to tell you the kind of…damage, rumors can cause? Especially one regarding you and Ash?"

_How did he see us? _Severa frowned. _I didn't pick up on anyone when we went into the room._ "What's your point?" She snapped.

"Well, it would be a shame if someone were to…say, present this information at court." The noble smiled slyly.

Severa couldn't help it anymore. She facepalmed. It then evolved into a double facepalm as she shook her head in despair. "Gods, what a disaster." She sighed. "Are you REALLY trying to blackmail me for a date?"

The noble could tell from Severa's voice that she was deeply disappointed in him. That offended him far more than if she was actually angry at him.

Severa didn't let him respond. "Ok, you know what? Here's an ultimatum."

The noble then flinched as the tip of Severa's knife touched his throat. "If you try to pull ANY of that bullshit on ANY of us, I will personally eliminate you, your parents, your children, and your entire bloodline. Is that understood?" She growled.

"I don't think that's—"

"Have. I. Made. Myself. Clear." Severa's voice was ice cold.

The noble could tell that she was utterly serious…and perfectly confident about her ability to carry out the threat. Without giving her a response, he scrambled away from her knife and scurried along the hallway.

Severa simply tosses her hair, sheathes her knife, and goes on her merry way.

…

[Elsewhere]

…

…

…

[Plegian Territory, Hawk's Holdings]

…

"Daddy?"

Hawk looked up from his paperwork.

Kite stood at the doorway of his office, clutching a teddy bear that Hawk sewed himself.

"Yes, baby?" Hawk motioned to his little girl and she ran up to sit on his lap. "What's on your mind?"

"Why did you send that scary lady to Uncle Ash?" She asked.

_Severa sneezes...in a fairly un-ladylike fashion._

"I saw no reason to keep her here, Kite." Hawk replies.

"Well, ok, but…" Kite thinks hard. "She seemed kind of desperate."

Hawk shook his head. "That's not a nice thing to say about other people, Kite."

"It's true." Kite pouts.

_Not surprising. _Hawk thought. _Even Severa can't do everything at once, no matter how well equipped she was._

"Dad?" Kite asks again after a minute of silence.

"Yes?"

"…can I have a Pony?"

Hawk stopped his train of thought to look down at his daughter making the best puppy-eyes she could muster. "Did you…no, Kite. You may not yet have a pony."

"Boo." Kite grumbles, and endeavors to mess up Hawk's paperwork…without damaging anything, since that would just make her daddy mad. "Father." Kite suddenly drops the childishly sweet tone. "Is there something going on over there?"

Hawk follow's her daughter's finger to a spot on the map. "What makes you say that?"

"You're paying for a lot of mercenaries and almost all of them are sent over there."

"What did I tell you about peeking into letters?" Hawk bopped his daughter's head. "Our happy happy neighbors are making a land grab with bandits…you know how it is."

"I can go help." Kite offers.

"You will not." Hawk shoots her down.

"Uncle Ash would've let me do it." Kite mutters.

Hawk plays with his daughter's hair. "I know, and that is why you're not going. End of story."

Kite goes "bleh" and continues to mess with the documents on her father's desk.

…

…

"You really spoil your kid, sire." Hawk's aide told him during his evening work hours.

"I never had the chance to, so I'm making up for it now." Hawk responds gruffly. "What do you want?"

"Nothing of importance." The aide assures him. "There is, however, a bit of news concerning our neighbors overseas."

Hawk looks at the aide. "Walhart?" The aide nods. "What's the news?"

"His efforts to pacify the continent is being met with increased resistance from the rebel groups…but according to the data we accrued, it will simply be a matter of time before he cracks down on the rebels and break them entirely."

Hawk grimaces. "So much for that plan, I suppose. Do we have contacts with the rebels?"

"A tenuous one at best."

"It'll have to do." Hawk starts writing. "Have messengers prepared, I want this delivered immediately."

"At once, sire." The aide turns and leaves.

_Don't get too cocky, rebels. Or you'll get that head of yours sheared off before the Good Guys can go help you. _Hawk thought as he wrote.

…

…

[Castle Ylisstol, Ash Camera]

…

…

Y'know, I would say something like "I am contributing to the preparation of the party" but really all I'm doing is saying "hey Ninya, go help them out" and then staying as far away from the preparations as possible.

Judging by the fact that Nina has returned to being my attendant maid as of yesterday I'm assuming her role is done.

"Suffice to say I consider taking care of your well-being a necessary part of the party preparations, Sir Ash." Nina had said once I asked her about her duties.

_In other words: I need to watch over you so you don't fuck anything up._

Shouldn't she be tailing Nowi then?

…well, ok, Nowi's a benign pain in the ass, since she knows when to stop and does so accordingly.

Lissa though.

_Lissa played a little too hard one day and nearly gave Maribelle a heart attack when she slipped and fell into a small river. It's wintertime._

We were in attendance and Maribelle nearly tore herself to pieces with indecision regarding "preserving Lissa's purity" and "stopping Lissa from freezing to death".

Ultimately common sense won out and Lissa was properly dried off at the nearest inn.

She still got sick though.

_Maribelle insisted on treating Lissa but had other duties to take care of…and she couldn't just shrug them off._

So we sent Nina instead.

_And why we didn't go ourselves is because…?_

I don't trust in my caretaking abilities. There's a reason Nina got a job as a maid in the first place.

Regardless of…Lissa…trying to oust herself from the biggest party of the year™ she recovered quickly, and the celebrations got underway without much incident.

…So…cue fireworks, I guess? The party lasts for a full week and involves both nobles and common folk alike, and all of Ylisstol is the party field.

Nothing can _possibly _go right.

_Summary time!_

Lissa had her party hat the entire time.

**Day 1**: Everything is loud, everyone is cheering, there's a parade, there's so much noise I have migraines. Food is good. Nino, who's supposed to be the quintessential "good girl", somehow found a stash of wine with Nowi.

_We gained another rumor concerning the amount of girlfriends we may have._

Nino was not as embarrassed as we were, which might have been due to the alcohol. She also called us Lloyd at one point, which was awkward…but to be fair Lloyd is a handsome, handsome man, so it makes some level of sense.

…

**Day 2**: Everyone has calmed down some. The night attack from Risen, though expected, helped ground most people concerning the current situation…the party loses a little bit of its craziness, but it's no big deal.

Stahl and Vaike ate their way through the town and got kicked out of a pear tree. Unless that's the name of a bar I have no idea what happened.

Fredrick lost his shit when two drunk nobles got in a brawl and tried to involve Emmeryn in said fight when she tried to parley.

_In entirely unrelated news, Emmeryn is Chrom's older sister._

Nino has a hangover. Nina advised us to avoid seeing her, but we did. Nino is happy but very embarrassed about what she did. We brushed it off and neglected to mention her…uh, kissing brothers thing, since her memories about it were hazy.

_Again, Lloyd is a good looking man._

Nowi had somehow preserved her giant fish and had Fished (that's a technical term now) Sully in the face. Nobody is quite sure what happened afterwards but Nowi was found sulking in timeout with her giant fish and a small cake.

Not quite sure how that qualifies as timeout, but ok.

Olivia charmed everyone with a dance, and Lon'qu played bouncer when she attracted literally all the men.

He was a very good bouncer. He was, however, also very stoically handsome and easily flustered.

So Olivia played bouncer for him when he attracted literally all the women.

_They make a good couple._

_…_

**Day 3**: Lissa partied too hard and fell off from the balcony of the castle. Everyone's butt clenched. Magna rescued her when he was having a tussle with Minerva…by being in the right place at the right time.

The two wyverns were very annoyed at the idiot human having fallen off of the balcony.

_That particular balcony is now off limits for repairs._

Lissa was also put in timeout with Nowi's Giant War Fish.

Uh…Tharja got Robin drunk, somehow. I'll pretend that they had hot girl-on-girl action but once Tharja realized what she did she ran away, so that'll have to remain a fantasy. Also, Robin gets un-drunk very quickly.

…

What was the Taguel lady's name? Panne.

Panne befriended a nest of rabbits. Nowi had a lot of playmates and threatened to "Unleash the Fish" if they were threatened. We debated about the merits of teaching her the phrase "opening a can of whoop-ass" but…eh, she had her threats covered.

Cherche and I had a nice get-together in the castle garden. We had fluffy cake and chatted about inane things. Maribelle saw us and got really angry.

It might have been because I couldn't hold a poker face together at all, but when we asked Maribelle why she was so angry she merely got angrier and hit us over the head with her parasol.

Nowi was, for some reason, also in the area and jumped to our defense with her Giant War Fish. The Great Umbrella Fish War lasted for fifteen minutes and was, by all accounts, the highlight of the afternoon.

_Maribelle won. Nowi's War Fish finally had too much stress and snapped during the fight._

We (us and Nowi) gave her War Fish a proper warrior funeral.

At this point I'm worried that someone has been spiking my tea.

_…_

**Day 4: **The Ylissean Pegasus Knights performed an air show. Magna got angry that he was being ignored and wanted to go up as well, so we did.

The air show devolved into a free for all exhibition match before we got there.

_Devolved is the wrong word. The free for all was planned._

We got Cherche to go up with us and we played in the sky…we last about…until 20% of the original fighters were left before we were hit and were "out."

One: most violent game of tag I've ever played.

Two: most epically fun game of tag I've ever played.

We also attracted a lot of (good) attention for the fighting style, namely, the style of flying with a wingman...or a wingwoman, in this case. We took out Cordelia fighting as a team, so that was a plus.

_In other news…more rumors about girlfriends._

I think the amount of girls we're rumored to be interested in jumped by about fifty after the air battle.

There were a few of the smaller girls that picked up on the whole "flying with wingman" thing really quickly. I wonder if we can talk to Phila about having those girls transfer over?

We still need a dedicated Pegasus Knight trainer. Crap.

_In other news…_

Miriel brewed hard liquor. Like…it might as well be pure alcohol, apparently. At least she had the sense to distribute it in tiny, tiny cups.

Ricken had some.

It…didn't end well. Let's just leave it at that.

On the plus side, we learned that magical fire is affected by alcohol.

…

**Day 5: **Lon'qu challenged Gregor to a duel. Gregor didn't pay attention. Lon'qu is too much of a good guy to just attack Gregor outright.

Chrom tried to cook in a kitchen…he felt bad about all the overtime work the castle cooks were getting and wanted to help out.

He succeeded in putting a (raw) chicken into the wall. When we removed the chicken it had left a small crater in the wall.

He was working with vegetables, so none of us knew how the chicken got there to begin with.

The chicken was confiscated by Nina who politely but firmly shooed Chrom out of the kitchen. She then got shooed out of the kitchen by the head chef since she wasn't a part of the staff and was slowing down their work…she was too used to being able to do everything by herself (since she alone takes care of four of us, one of them being Nowi) and is very efficient…but that doesn't translate well to teamwork.

Fredrick and Cordelia were caught by Nowi. Whatever mood they had was utterly ruined by her cheering them on.

_Severa is born in January, so it wasn't straight up sex._

We saw Morgan talk to Robin. Judging by their body language (there was too much ambient noise for us to eavesdrop at a safe distance) it was small talk…but Morgan, at least, seems to have some kind of reaction towards Robin.

We (us and Nina) caught Severa and we had a nice talk…Nina got cued in to the whole future kids business, which is a little worrying for us. I might have to get Nina some formal training.

As a side note: Severa is weak to hugs. She will Tsun SO hard upon contact, but she is weak to hugs.

As a second side note: Severa either does not recognize Morgan or does not have a good opinion of him. Her body language is unclear and she's unwilling to say anything specific.

As a third side note: Severa may have accidentally blown her own cover when Cordelia went and talked to her. Jury's out on exactly what happened, but Severa sprinting away from the dining hall is suspicious as all hell.

_We're out of side notes._

Nino was approached by a noble interested in marrying her. She politely turned him down.

Donnel got roped into a Nowi Scheme.

One of the inns partied so hard the floor collapsed. Vaike denies any involvement.

In related news, Vaike has lost his axe.

_Lastly?_

Uh…

_Go on._

At…at Anna's behest (we don't know which Anna it is, five of them attended the party in the castle alone) we took Maribelle out on a date above town, flying with Magna. Magna decided to do some rollercoaster flying (lots of ups, downs, rolls…)

I don't know how much money went into Anna's suggestion but judging by how angry Fredrick was the amount was probably substantial.

_Maribelle liked us well enough that she played along with the whole thing._

I have to admit I blanked out for much of the date thing. I mean…I saw her carry around a thin, long mallet with a head the rough size of a spoon but it had FUCKING SPIKES ON IT and it worried me greatly.

_To elaborate: We saw Maribelle use said spike mallet on a young noble. When the spike mallet was applied to the poor man's family jewels all males in attendance (a substantial amount, as this happened in the castle garden) shared the pain._

But in the end she was polite enough to peck us on the cheek, so all was well.

_Lissa showed up and was a (gasping) witness, causing Maribelle to become so flustered she tried to End us._

I locked my door that night.

…

**Day 6: **Everyone's pretty partied out by this point.

We spent the day just sitting around in the castle garden with Ninya. Nino showed up at one point and hung out, so that was nice.

It snowed.

Lissa and Nowi organized a snowball war in the courtyard.

By Fredrick's estimates, around 200 people attended.

There were no sides.

Victor: Nowi. She cheated by catching snowballs thrown at her and throwing them back at the throwers.

Honorable mentions:

This one noble kid that used wind magic to rapid-fire snowballs.

Lissa, who caught a cold and lost her party hat. She was utterly devastated by the loss of the party hat.

_We found it later and made another one out of spell paper for her. The party hat 2.0 sparkles and glows._

Gregor, for his impeccable aim. The man never targeted anything other than the stomach.

One of the small Pegasus Knight girls for her impeccable aim. She aimed low and hard and Gregor was tall.

Miriel, for joining in on a snowball fight to begin with.

**Maribelle, **for joining in on a snowball fight to begin with.

_Maribelle went down early: she took a hit meant for Lissa._

Ninya, who got annoyed by one of the noble brats yelling she hit him square on the head with a snowball…from where we were sitting.

_The snowball was in the air for at least twenty seconds._

Fredrick, for maintaining some semblance of order in the fight.

**Emmeryn, **who actually came down to watch the melee.

Losers:

About fifteen noble kids. Nobody liked them, apparently.

This one kid who looked like she was four: she tripped in the snow and got really sad.

This one kid who looked like he was four: Nowi hit him with a snowball the size of his head.

Nowi. Her winter clothes got wet. We're not quite sure why that makes her a loser (since snow is just water but lazier) but she wanted us to write it down, so there you go.

_We wrapped Nowi in a cozy blanket and Ninya got all of us something hot and delicious._

…

**Day 7: **I at least was entirely gone. There was just too much food and too much happiness going around.

I commandeered a large room and built a large aero bed.

_Imagine a place the size of a living room. Now imagine all of it filled with Bed. The aero bed, incidentally, is just us putting spell paper underneath several layers of fabric and material. It's a water bed with none of the water._

The end result is a bed that is fluffy, huge, warm, and cool at the same time.

Nowi found it first and happily jumped on.

Nina found it second but she brought food from the kitchen.

Morgan found it third, and he had somehow dragged Severa with him.

Last were Cherche and Lissa. Lissa thanked me for the new and improved party hat.

We all just had a wonderfully relaxing day on the room-sized bed.

_ As Lissa describes it: It's like sleeping on a cloud._

Also, I am not helping my case when it comes to the rumors of my Virion-esque behavior. The least I can say is that I'm not skulking behind the girls I'm "courting."

_Remember how Nino got (kinda) proposed to? It happened at least five more times during the party week. We seriously considered doing the same ourselves just to get the other nobles to stop._

Nino learns magic at an obviously accelerated pace and she's very well behaved, so a lot of the top noble houses want her in the family for the kids that will eventually happen…the fact that Nino has definitely gotten more attractive (even growing out her hair like her Sage sprite) certainly doesn't hurt her image any.

_Her lack of a family tree (due to being a victim of teleportation or something) is a too-small black mark._

In any case, we approached Nino with this "solution" at one point (read: she found the massive bed and joined in) and…well, obviously Nino wasn't going to go with it.

_There were five other girls on the bed and involved in the conversation. If we did not present all of the information (as in: "Hey I have a stupid idea for stopping the suitors, wanna hear me out?") we would've died there._

"I'm still looking for a way home." Nino had said.

Which segues quite well into what we plan on doing, so we invite Nino to go back home with us when we leave…we still need a solution for not having Amelia, too. Damn it.

…

One thing at a time, I suppose.

…

[Next Day]

…

So who's the person we need to ask for information? Hmm…

_A librarian or a scribe?_

In that case, let's see…Ylisstol's castle library is…that way…

_Miriel is sitting barely out of our line of sight, reading something very intently._

"Can I help you?" The librarian at the front desk asks. "It's unusual for anyone other than Miriel to show up here on the first day of the new year."

No surprise, considering how much alcohol was thrown around. "Yeah, well…I'm looking for information. Do you happen to know anything about Outrealm Gates?"

The librarian stares at me. "I take it you're the Outrealmer…Ash, was it?"

"The very same." I nod.

The librarian gets up and leads us to a small, dark section in the back of library. Note to self: invent lamp.

"This is all of the information we have concerning Outrealm gates." The librarian says, indicating to a row of books. "As you might expect, the study of something as ephemeral as an Outrealm gate is difficult."

"Every little bit helps, thanks." I take all the books and find a table.

…

[Hours later]

…

This is utterly useless.

All of this information is theory. I mean, it's interesting, but none of this is actually _useful_.

…Alright, fine. ONE thing is useful…if it is true, and since this particular book was obviously not written with correct scientific experimentation its accuracy is very, very debatable…In any event, it seems to be a universal constant that every world has one Stable Outrealm Gate, and a myriad of unstable gates that can be opened or closed.

The position and appearance of the stable gate is debatable though. The Outrealm Gate of this particular world is said to be positioned above a body of water.

_The game placed it southwest of the starting Prologue town._

I wonder if I fell through a gate? I sure as hell don't remember doing anything special before I showed up here…as an aside, the harnessing of the unstable gates is the fundament of teleportation magic. I imagine that the rampant teleportation we see in games is not nearly as common as it is in real life.

_Like that assassin on chapter 13._

Hmm…there is no conclusive way to check to see if a gate exists or not. It just 'does'.

…

Then again I guess I'm being really unfair to the people who were told to test the gate into an alternate universe. I mean…it might be really hard to collect accurate data when fucking up means never being able to report the results.

…

In any event, if the gate exists around there then we should be able to find it, somehow.

Let's ask around some more.

_After we left, Miriel stole all the notes we abandoned on the table._

…

"Hey Chrom, got a minute?"

It stands to reason (read: we're crossing our fingers as hard as we can) that the main character would know where to go and what to look for.

"Oh, Ash." Chrom stops his wall demolishing practice. "Sure. Happy new year, by the way."

"Ah, yeah." It doesn't feel like a new year. "Do you know if there is an Outrealm gate south of here?"

"That's…quite specific." Chrom cleans up the practice dummy he's smashed to pieces. "Is there a specific reason that you're trying to find it?"

So he knows that it exists. "Well, if it works out like I think it will then I'll have some pretty interesting technology on my hands."

"Interesting, huh…" Chrom thinks for a minute. "Does this have anything to do with Valm, by chance?"

That makes it easier. "Yeah, it does." I nod. "Valm's invasion of our continent is a given, the question is simply 'when', so I want to be ready when they show up."

"You have no sense of a fair fight, do you, sir Ash." Fredrick asks behind me…the fuck was he doing? Dude is naked from the waist up.

"The concept of a fair fight is misleading to begin with." I respond. "Regardless of how you frame it, if Valm invades it will be a long, tough slog of a war."

"With massive losses on both sides, I expect." Chrom grimaces. "So will what you obtain stop that war?"

Well… "No, it will not. I never expected it to." Maintain eye contact with Chrom. "My goal is pretty simple: to make sure that all of the losses are on their side, not ours."

"You sound like Robin when she's pushed a little too far." Chrom laughs. "As far as I am aware, we have an Outrealm gate somewhere in the sky off of the Ylissean shoreline…but that's as much as I know."

"Not a problem, man. It helps a lot." I grin.

"Ash, if I may." Fredrick coughs. "I would like to know if you are trustworthy."

You what now? "Are you worried about me turning against you?" Still?

"Precisely. You have considerable leverage along the western coast of Ferox…and Plegia, if our sources are to be believed." Fredrick says.

_So he's been spying on us…actually, we're probably being spied on by all kinds of factions._

I didn't know I had that kind of influence, actually.

"Indeed." Fredrick nods. "Many nobles believe that the support you garner from the populace could easily rival that of a Khan…I'm sure you are aware of the implications."

Well…huh.

I mean, I knew I was popular with the normal folk, considering how much shit we've been getting from the nobles that haven't adopted our methodology yet.

_Our methodology of having zero concept of social class._

I didn't think I would have influence over the entire coast…well, shit. The more eyes I have on me the less freedom I have to move.

…Oh well.

I was never afraid of diplomatically stomping on feet before. Not about to start now.

_If we have prestige in other towns, then we may be able to expand our operations in terms of scale…quality might suffer as a result though._

"My question is, Ash…" Fredrick stares at me. The fact that he's naked from the waist up is really disconcerting. "What do you plan to do with that power of yours after Valm has been defeated?"

…

Uh.

"I don't know. I haven't thought that far." I shrug…which is a half-truth.

"Fredrick, that's enough." Chrom says sharply. "He's our friend, and that will never change."

…

…

[3rd Person Camera]

…

…

Lissa and Nowi, clutching the documents and hat they…borrowed…from Miriel, skulked around the corner of the entrance into the training hall, where they saw Ash last.

Upon his exit…

"ASH!" Nowi yelled happily and tried to give him a jump hug, but the massive hat on her head obscured her vision and she missed.

"Take us with you!" Lissa exclaims joyfully while taking out a small hammer from her waist.

"Take you where?" Ash sounds puzzled as he tries to determine if Lissa's hammer is a threat while checking behind him to see if Hat Nowi on the ground was ok.

_Hat Nowi is fine, by the way._

"Here!" Lissa thrusts the documents she stole from Miriel into Ash's face.

Ash scans it for a fraction of a second before frowning. "I don't even know if it really exists yet. Or how to get through it, as a matter of fact—"

"Oh, please." Nowi jumps onto Ash's back. "We know you know what you're doing. Now take us!"

Ash felt like pleading. "I'm serious! This time it's—"

"Something interesting going on?" Robin raises an eyebrow as she sees Nowi piggybacking on Ash. "That I should know about?"

_Ah, shit. _Ash thought.

…

"Well, well, well…" Robin grins. "You can't possibly expect us to just sit back while you discover a door to another world, right?"

"Yes, I do. There are a staggering number of complications that can occur that I don't even know about yet." Ash insists.

"Uh huh." Robin was unconvinced. "You were never the all-or-nothing type." She observes.

Ash sighs and un-hooks Nowi from head (we're not sure how it works either). "Fine, fine…I think the gate can only be reached from the air. So unless you feel like asking Phila to loan you a few Pegasus Knights…"

"I think we can manage." Cherche smiles.

…

…

[1st Person Camera]

…

…

Note to self: take better care of the scrap notes I make.

In any case...Nowi and Lissa found Miriel very intently reading a set of books, so Nowi decided to play a prank on Miriel and steal her hat…so when Miriel didn't react to her hat being taken, the two of them asked her why she was so focused.

Cut to…now. Me, Cherche and Lissa (surprisingly enough) are soaring through the sky south, to find that Outrealm Gate.

Lissa's a half-pegasus knight now. She's allowed to fly but not on combat missions.

_With us include: Nina (she was tending to Magna at the stables and got roped into this), Nino (innocent bystander recruited by Robin), Nowi, and Robin._

_We're transporting Nina and Nowi, Cherche has Robin, and Lissa has Nino._

Nino's now taller than Lissa, interestingly enough.

…

"Master, if you are searching for the Outrealm Gate…does that mean you are going home?" Nina asks me.

"I've thought about it." I admit. "But right now there are more immediate issues I'm trying to resolve…plus, going home means not getting to come back, so that sucks."

"Thank goodness." Nina breathes. "If you left, I would be out of a job."

_She likes us~_

If she didn't like us after working for us for a full year I'm gonna be real disappointed.

…

The three of us fly to the southern edge of the continent…not all that far from Ylisstol, maybe an hour at a brisk flight speed.

_A brisk speed for everybody but us; we outfitted Lissa's Pegasus with Magna's cruise engines (and rigging). Magna's a young Wyvern though, so he kept up like a champ._

…

"So, Ash. What next?" Robin asks as we circle around aimlessly over the ocean.

I shrug. "You got me. Look for something unusual." Upon seeing Robin's blank stare… "Hey, you wanted to tag along after I made it very clear I had no idea what I was looking for."

"Not even what it looks like?" Robin…is probably rolling her eyes. "Amazing."

It's probably blue and round or something…a Gate to the Other World is always stereotypically blue and round.

_We search for about thirty minutes and find nothing._

"Ash." Nowi suddenly points upwards, and we follow her finger to find…uh.

A…thing. I guess it's the Outrealm gate?

It…huh.

_We ascend to the same level as the gate._

I'm amazed it actually exists.

"I don't see anything." Nina remarks.

"Me neither." Nino says.

"That might be a good thing. Gods…it's making me uncomfortable." Robin grumbles.

It…the Door…it feels like its rapidly switching shape between a circle and a sphere, and every time my mind gets accustomed to its shape it flips again. It also looks solid and empty at the same time.

_Have you ever seen a picture of like, really, REALLY effective light absorbing paint? It feels like that, where the brain is sure that the object in front of it is flat but the eyes are like "nuh-uh, it's empty."_

We reach out and touch the…blue empty full ball egg flat thing. Watch it turn green.

_It turns green._

God fucking dammit.

_Instantly we're enveloped by some kind of kaleidoscopic room. An old man stands in front of us._

"Yo." He…sounds a lot younger than he should.

"Why does he sound like a woman?" Robin wonders…he sounds quite manly to me.

"You're…uh…" Calling him 'bubba' right off the bat might be slightly offensive.

"Bubba's fine, Ash." He says. "So what brings you and your harem to the other side of reality?"

"Uh…"

"Harem?" Robin glares at me.

"In my defense!" I hold up a finger. "All of you chose to be here."

"So, where will it be, my boy?" Bubba clasps his hands together. He's…a very energetic old manwoman.

"Where can I go?" I ask him.

"Home, for one." He winks.

…Really? It was that easy?

"Damn straight. Who did you think we were?" Bubby huffs. "If you want to go home just say the word."

…but it's a one way trip, since I don't know where the gate on Earth would be located…does he know? "Bubba."

"The Earth Gate is in the mantle, so yeah, that return trip's gonna be _hard_." Bubba grins. "You can always hope for a temporary gate, y'know?"

Eh…figured as much. "Nah, I'm not going home. I have a question."

"Shoot."

Let's be as on-the-nose as possible with our question. "What DLC maps do I have access to?"

"Sounds expensive." Robin says confusedly.

"Only the ones you bought." Bubba responds.

Ain't that convenient. Uh… well we have two worlds to go to. One has sun and the other has water. "Summer Scramble, if you will."

"No problemo…timescale is one to one, here we go!" Bubba snaps his fingers and a door BAMs into existence.

_The big double-side door suddenly appeared and made a loud BAM noise._

"All aboard!" Bubba ok dude why do you have a giant flyswattEEEER

_He hit all of us into the door._

…

…

My ass hurts.

There's a bright spot on my eyelids.

_Open your eyes?_

Good idea.

We open our eyes and see…the insides of what looks like an elaborate straw building. Complete with a counter and a very smiley Anna.

_A smiley Anna in a smokin' hot red bikini._

"Oh! New customers! Welcome!" Anna grins.

.

.

.

{ === + === }

Author Notes:

Parties are weird.

Also, before I forget.

asiano1(point)deviantart(point)com/art/Lucina-and-the-ultimate-anti-grima-weapon-545679864

The above is what could happen if Ash could reproduce the Falchion's effects. (Thank you Death to Original Naming~)

also,

asiano1(point)deviantart(point)com/art/Nowi-547509192

Winter Nowi! (Same Author)

Also also, Nowi and her Giant War Fish! (still Death to Original Naming~)

asiano1(point)deviantart(point)com/art/Nowi-and-the-Giant-War-Fish-Ver-2-551192638


	24. Interlude - 5x: Summer Scramble

{ === + === }

"Oh my! Visitors from my home town! How nice!" Anna claps her hands together. "Looks like you guys came in from somewhere cold. Did all of you come from Ilia?"

"No, we're from…Ylisse." Robin responds in a daze, looking around while shielding her eyes from the sun. "This place is really bright."

Anna laughs. "Of course it's bright, silly; we're on the beach! It can't be anything but bright on the beach."

"Uh…Anna…why is she here?" Nino points to Anna (while asking all present company).

Anna looks annoyed. "I run this joint, why would I be here otherwise? Now c'mon, all of you need to get changed. I can't have people dressed like they're from a snowstorm out here, it'll be bad for business!"

Anna snaps her fingers without waiting for a response and summons a troop of Servant!Annas (like Anna but smaller-looking and with orangish hair) who then corral the girls off somewhere.

"Now then…you, Mister Ash." Anna's smile doesn't falter from her face, even when Ash didn't look like he was paying attention. "Hey, Ash." She snaps her fingers. "Less spacing out, more talking."

"Oh, uh, sorry." Ash shakes his head. "I wasn't expecting you to…" Ash looks around. "Did you seriously build your—"

"Did I build my business around a gateway to other dimensions? Of course I did." Anna's grin was proud. "I wasn't about to let an opportunity like that get away."

"Wow." Ash shakes his head again, this time in awe. "That's incredible."

"What, these?" Anna leans forward and winks.

"Er."

…

[1st Person Camera]

…

That's not what I meant, but I need Anna to be happy for my plan. Shit. I wish I was a bit smoother right about now.

_There is nothing immediate we can say that would sound not-creepy._

"Yeah, wait, no." _The best we came up with._

Anna laughs _hard_. "You are so innocent, Ash."

…Huh. "Did Bubba tell you we were coming?"

"Better than guesswork…faster, too." Anna grins. "So are you going to stand and talk, or are you going to actually have a little fun?"

…

She said that like we had a choice.

_A Servant!Anna gave us swimming trunks and Overlord!Anna kicked us out onto the beach._

There's actually nobody here besides us.

_So we get changed and sit down on a cloth underneath a massive umbrella._

"It doesn't look like there's much business here." I hear Robin behind me. I know she was rushed off to be changed, so the fact that she's out here means she's done changing. I'm terrified of turning around.

_But we do anyways._

…

"What?" Robin mumbles.

This…is gonna be real bad for us.

_Robin's wearing a black variant of what Anna was wearing._

I mean…on one hand Bikini Robin is incredibly attractive, but on the other hand…she's pale. Like…nerdy pale. Paler than we are, actually, which is saying something.

_Like "Gondor calls for aid" pale. We also may or may not be exaggerating just a touch._

"You don't leave the castle too often, do you?" I ask her.

Robin turns a little red. "I'm the Shepherd's tactician, so I don't get to travel around at random."

"So I see." I grin. "You do have amazing skin, even if it is glowing like a lighthouse."

Robin rolls her eyes. "You are becoming Virion in his absence."

"Ash! Aaaaash!" I hear Nowi squeal with excitement. "It's the Ocean!"

Let's see…Nowi and Lissa both went with a more moderate two-piece with frills. They're both very cute, if a little childish looking.

_Better not mention that to Lissa._

"Ocean!" Lissa echoes as the two of them blaze past the two of us on the ground and jump into the clear water.

I didn't know they could swim. Granted they're not wading out to deep water or anything, but…

_Hope there aren't any sharks around._

"So what did you plan to do here all by yourself?" Robin asks as we watch Lissa and Nowi try to out-splash each other in the water. "This would make for a mediocre vacation without us around."

Yeah, it would be, but "It's a business trip, and let's leave it at that." Considering the current circumstances my hands are tied, so let's just enjoy the time in the sun…we didn't bring sunscreen, did we? It's gonna be weird when we go back to our universe and have sunburns in the middle of winter.

_We left the castle with no less than five girls. It's gonna be weird no matter what happens._

That being said, the sun doesn't feel like it's burning, so there's probably some kind of defensive system in place…or maybe it's a largely artificial environment? I don't know if this place is like a real location or like a pocket dimension or something—

"Hey. Ash. Focus." Robin snaps her fingers in front of my face.

"Huh? What?" I look around a little.

…Hello, Ninya and Nino. You picked some very nice looking one-pieces.

_Purple and green respectively. They're wearing more tones than that, but those were the two colors I caught first._

"I guess they don't catch your eye, huh? How mean." Robin pretends to cry.

_Interestingly enough, of the two of them it's Nino that plays along. Ninya Just takes a seat next to us._

I shrug. "They do, it's just that I'm deeply terrified right now."

"Oh really. And why is that, o Sir Ash?" Robin raises an eyebrow.

…

…Y'know what?

…

"Because all of you are incredibly beautiful and it makes me nervous."

"Oh my, how bold!" Anna says behind me. "That's awfully forward of you, Mister Outrealmer."

I don't think that title has any meaning in a place like this. "I'm telling the truth."

_Let's take a look at the reactions:_

_Robin and Nino had surprised looks on their faces._

_Nina was a little bit blushy._

_Lissa and Nowi were too busy playing to hear anything._

Turn around…

_Cherche looks extremely smug (also wow that swimsuit)._

_Anna doesn't count._

_Magna, by virtue of being a Wvyern, cares little for human speech and jumps straight into the ocean to play with Lissa and Nowi._

Why are we tallying up the behaviors of the mounts? Minerva is just sunbathing, and Lissa's Pegasus (Its name is Huey) is looking for coconuts on palm trees.

_It's very obviously looking for something on top of the trees so we're assuming it's looking for coconuts._

"Then coming in here was the right place!" Anna laughs. "If you'd like I can arrange for a private suite just for you and that special someone…if you're picking just one."

And to think I'm going to talk shop with her later. "That's…uh, I don't think we're staying the night."

"We're not?" Robin, Nino, and Nina all ask at once.

Fuck.

I frown. "Wouldn't the castle miss us? Bubba said it was a timescale of one to one."

"Uh-huh. One minute here is one minute in your world." Anna nods.

"Eh…I'm sure they'll manage. You already cleared it with Chrom." Robin waves it off.

Can…can I have the Risen army show up now? Just so we can kill it and then go home? I feel like that would be safer at this point.

"So…are we staying…?" Nino asks hesitantly.

Goddamn puppy eyes. I'm gonna regret this. "One night can't hurt."

"Wonderful!" Anna hands me a slip of paper. "Here's the bill."

…this is incredibly expensive.

_We kind of point to the bill and look at Anna incredulously._

"You'd be amazed how often people choose to run away during the night." Anna winks. "This covers my costs, hun."

I…ok, that's an unfortunate implication.

_An implication picked up by only Robin._

Rough coughs nervously. "Well, I'm glad you're paying, I suppose?" She glances at Anna. "Imagine if the Annas at home realized you were running a—"

_Anna gently puts a hand on Robin's shoulder and Robin instantly shuts up._

…

"She's…immensely powerful." Robin mutters to me when Anna moves on to the two girls trying to out-splash the ocean. "How on earth is she that powerful?"

She runs an interdimensional summer resort…I think power is just part of the package. "I wonder how long did she have this place?"

"I'm too afraid to ask." Robin replies.

_We watch Anna (at Nowi's request) pick up the little dragon lady and toss her into the sky. It was, (un)fortunately, a normal toss that only went up a few feet and Nowi fell into the water cheering/screaming/something._

…

Notable afternoon events:

The Service Annas (Annamaids?) were in charge of food and brought us a lot of drinks and light foods. I guess they knew about the massive party we had or something, since there was nothing heavy or greasy served.

Nowi got stuck in a tree. She got de-stuck when she lost her grip and fell. She's fine though.

Lissa and Nino built a sandcastle.

Ninya napped. She also had the slightly catlike behavior where she stretched and then stayed in the stretched position.

Robin challenged Anna to a game of chess. It was indecisive due to Magna and Minerva flying low and fast over it and scattering the pieces.

_Hiiiighwaaay toooo the DANGERzone!_

Cherche also napped…but she was sunbathing instead.

We…rehearsed.

Because we're gonna need it.

…

…

…

_Following a few hours of play, Anna led our group to a very nice looking house with a set of rooms. We will not be surprised if she created this house just for our use._

Lissa and Nowi (having played themselves out during the afternoon) immediately crashed after picking out their rooms. It's not even a full day after the party, so their immediate sleepiness might also be booze-induced.

Cherche and Robin found a stash of books Anna had (read: she gave it to them) and they retreated to some back room to read them.

Nino was really…uh…sad? Not really sad. She was feeling guilty about making us (me) spend a large sum of money because of the six of them, so I had to use Nina to get her to calm down or something. I don't know what Nina did but Nino's out of my hair and happier, so that's good.

_Why did we need her out of our hair?_

Deep breathes.

Ok…Ok.

…

…

"Anna? Can I have a moment?"

Anna turns and flashes a huge grin. "Sure thing, Ashy boy. What do you need?"

_Fingers crossed that she doesn't just obliterate us on the spot._

Here goes. "I would like to buy your Megaphone and Snapshot Tomes."

…

_She didn't kill us on the spot! Victory!_

"You are…certainly one of the more interesting Outrealmers." Anna says slowly. "What makes you think I have something like that?"

Apart from the momentary shock on your face? "Let's call it uncanny foresight." I shrug.

She observes us through narrowed eyes for a minute. "Alright then." She beckons for us to follow, and we do.

_To a cozy room that's probably her private room._

"Here we are." Anna pulls out two thick and very new-looking tomes. "Now then, what are you willing to give me for these?"

Are they the real deal though?

_Protip: Do not question the authenticity of a merchant's wares when you're trying to make a hard deal._

Well, shit. "If they do as their name suggests, then they would be worth every penny…and I have a lot of pennies."

Anna raises an eyebrow. "And what's the monetary value of a penny?"

"Not a whole lot." It's worth more as raw metal than money anyways.

"Well…if you know what these books are, then you know just how valuable they are, no?" Anna flips open the Snapshot tome and activates the spell.

_Twenty pages of the book tear themselves out and dissipate into the air. A picture (with our face on it) forms itself in Anna's hand as a result._

"I daresay these are the only copies that exist in the world." Anna winks. "So they're rather priceless, wouldn't you say?"

_If the DLC maps are to be believed, then it's not true: the Anna in the Hot Springs Scramble map should have these spellbooks too._

Let's just be thankful that these books exist at all. Also, if she's calling them priceless then this is going to go a lot less smoothly than I imagined.

Now how do I approach this? "Well…you _did _make those spellbooks…for the record: under the best circumstances I would rather hire you personally, but this whole Dimensional thing makes that difficult. So I have to settle for the alternate option."

"Oh my." Anna grins. "Sounds like you've been practicing."

_We laugh nervously. _"Yes I have. These books are incredibly important…they're going to save the lives of my girls if I use them right."

"You don't look like the kind that has kids." Anna observes.

I nod. "No, I do not. But I do run a squadron of Pegasus Knights."

"Ah." Anna taps her lips. "Well, I suppose I can make an exception…200000 gold each."

That's…less than I expected. It's still hellishly expensive, though.

Let's see if we can talk it down some. "That's pretty pricy for a set of books you don't have much opportunity to use."

"I get plenty of opportunity. I just don't have much patience to recreate the circles." Anna huffs.

Hmm. "Well…I could provide you with the first set of copies we make…provided that the original copy's price can be reduced?"

"How many copies are we talking about?" Anna's eyes light up.

_Good to know she's not into copying millions of spell circles day in and day out._

"Let's say…twenty copies of each." _We look into her eyes…and she's a little bit interested. _"In return, 100000 for each book."

"Just a hundred?!" _Anna's indignant. _"The fruits of my spellcrafting talents are worth far more than that!" I think I caught an implied 'as you should know' at the end.

"They are, but I'm shouldering the cost of production if you go through with the deal. If you value each book at even 50000 gold then having twenty copies of both is worth way more than the…supposed…lost profits."

_No dice. _"If you're valuing these books at their proper worth then I'd be getting more." Anna folds her arms.

"True…but I'm not about to pay out the nose _and _give you product." I try to look relaxed. "This is an opportunity here, and…well, opportunities don't come cheap."

_Anna doesn't budge_. "An opportunity for a set of resources I may never receive. I didn't see you come in with bags of gold."

I guess that means Anna doesn't run on credit. "It would have led to too many awkward questions." _We motion to the rooms of the tagalongs. _"I've done a lot of business with Annas, and I have no wish to destroy my reputation by shortchanging you."

"What did you do business with my sisters for?"

"Nothing too serious, mostly just for equipment." True in many senses.

_In game they sell us good gear at a discount, in world we rely on them to move equipment made by the Workshop to other parts of the country._

"Oh, so you're that guy, I see…" Anna mutters…that doesn't sound good for me.

Doesn't hurt to check. "_That guy_?"

"Some of the Annas have been very vocal about picking up a steady supplier." Anna says evenly.

_That sounds like good news but Anna's expression is very neutral._

"Well, yeah…" I do have a couple of Annas technically on payroll.

_Technically. If they were really on payroll they would be paid a lot, and that would be bad for our bottom line. As a side note: the Anna playable unit in the game does not work for us._

We don't really know her that well either. Playable Anna I mean.

"Hmm." This Anna scratches her chin. "Well, that changes things a little bit."

I hope it's a good little bit.

"How do you plan to get me the money?" Anna asks slyly.

"Depends, what other kinds of legal tender do you take?" I mean…Magna's strong and all but I'm pretty sure we're going to attract a lot of attention if we fly a few hundred thousand gold around.

"Lots of things." Anna winks. "This is the Outrealms, after all."

_She looked oddly dejected after saying that._

…I wonder what kind of things she took for payment before. She's like that one CLAMP lady.

"It would ultimately be easier if you accepted the derivative products." I shrug. "I can't fly around with something like fifty-k gold without someone asking questions…and lugging around that much money on the ground is unsafe."

"Mmm…" Anna stares at me. "Hmm."

So we're looking down on her bikini and it's a very…it's unnerving. Because we're trying to be professional and it's hard.

_Cough cough._

"How much are you willing to go through to get these tomes?" Anna finally asks.

_Not half a million gold._

I feel like I should avoid lying. "I can live with not getting them at all. If I end up not getting the books then I will just divert resources into doing other things. At the end of the day my goal is the survival of my girls, and…well, if I can't get you to part with the spells then I'll find some other way to keep them alive." _We grin. _"Up to and including just outright nuking the opposition."

_Metaphor. It's a metaphor. We can't actually invent nuclear warheads._

She glares at me. "I see. You're willing to kill a few thousand just to save a handful?"

I nod. "Sucks, but it has to be done."

She raises an eyebrow.

"It's a war." I shrug. "I'm not dumb enough to believe I can save everyone."

"You should be dumb enough to try." She says.

I nod. "Which is why I'm here."

She taps her lips with her finger again. "Alright then, here's the deal. 120000 gold for each, and I get 25 copies of your derivative product."

Come to think of it, Anna probably keeps spares. I can't imagine any shopkeeper only having one of something. "110000 for 20. I need to find people to make the spellbooks and that costs money."

Anna stares into my eyes. "Deal." She finally sighs. "You were entirely prepared to pay the full price, no? Also, what are you doing?"

_We're scribbling into a small pocket notebook we're carrying._

"Writing a check." Technically it's an IOU, but meh. "Proper documentation and all that. Here you go." We give her her copy. "This way you can hunt me down if I fail to pay."

She looks at the small slip of paper with a raised eyebrow. "I…see. I don't know if you're smart or stupid."

"A little from column A, a little from column B." I smile…then yawn.

It didn't take a long time but my god is talking to God!Anna mentally exhausting…though it's probably less mental and more her poking us with magic.

_We bit her farewell after a little more small talk and find our room, and then crash onto the bed._

…

_Feel like cuing everyone in on what you did that for?_

The two spellbooks give me access to two seriously powerful fields of research: the manipulations of light and sound. Both fields can be used for offensive and defensive purposes…and, well. I'll have to do some serious experimentation to see the limitations of what I can do with both spells, but we should be able to do some pretty interesting things when it comes to meeting that massive army with our group of forty girls.

Like, y'know, the total annihilation of Valmese forces through American firepower.

Tired now. sleeping.

…

…

…

"Ash! Ash! Wakey wakey!"

Someone…whoever it is. Stop it.

_We wake up to someone bouncing on our bed. We…uh, not really wake up. It was kind of late and we were tired, so it's less us waking up and us slowly peeling ourselves away from the soft, soft bed._

Fuck. I want caffeine. I want whatever the person bouncing on my bed had this morning.

Is it Nowi? It's probably Nowi.

_We've buried our head in the pillow._

"Aaaaash!" Nowi ok stop that.

_We shake Nowi off as she's breathing onto the back of our neck._

"Ow." Nowi mutters somewhere on the floor. "C'mon! Wake up!"

"uuuuuugh." We roll over.

…

"What." I'm not sure if I'm still dreaming, if I'm hallucinating, or if Nowi's head has changed shape. Where are my glasses?

_We pat around the end table for our glasses and put them on while Nowi bounces happily on her feet for us._

She has cat ears.

Why does she have cat ears

Who the hell gave her cat ears

"Nowi?" It's…really bright in here. My eyes hurt.

"Nyeah?" Nowi does the…thing. With the things on her hands.

_Translation: Nowi does the cat pose (she brings her hand up to her face height) but instead of miming a cat paw with her hand clenched as a fist she's wearing a cat paw glove._

"What did you do this time." I sigh and sit up.

"I found these!" She says happily. "They're so cute!"

It's…way too goddamned early for Sugar!Nowi.

I'm slowly waking up. "Ok, yeah…fine…now shoo. I need to get dressed."

_Sleepy Ash didn't notice, but Nowi was had a cat tail on as well. It was very obviously tied around her waist._

…

_Consciousness in 3…2…_

The fuck did I just wake up to?

_There we go._

…

I get dressed and step outside (well, put on swimming trunks, since it's the beach) and the FIRST thing I see is catpeople.

Like I wish I was kidding but everyone is cats.

_We are actually ok with this._

"Yo. Good mornin'." Robin grins. "What do you think?"

_Y'all be crazy. _

"What happened while I was asleep?" I ask more diplomatically. "And…where did you get all of that?"

All of that being: cat ears, gloves, tail…very obviously attached to a ring around her waist because of swimsuit.

"Anna had them." She said as she stroked the cattail. "She had a lot of them, actually."

So we noticed.

_Everyone has cat stuff. Including Morgan, who, I feel compelled to clarify, is a dude._

Morgan pulls it off pretty well, all things considered.

The people happiest with this thing—also how did they get Cherche to play along?—are Nowi, Lissa, and Morgan. Nino and Nina are playing along…not exactly unwillingly, all things considered.

_Magna also has cat ears. The pink fluffy thing on top of his scaly head is very jarring. Also, Minerva may be laughing at him._

More importantly, we need to do a little yelling. "Anna! Anna!"

_We find Anna tending to a small stall not too far from the beach area._

"Ah! Good morning!" Anna says brightly.

_She has…fox…ears? They don't look cat._

"What…" We make gestures toward the beach area.

_We make more gestures toward the beach area while trying to form words with no success. Repeat a few times._

"I stock a lot of stuff." Anna says after it becomes clear we can't make a coherent sentence.

"Ok, but why…_that?_" We gesture (a little too aggressively) to Robin's cat ears.

_Robin indignantly goes 'hey'!_

Anna puts on the most infuriating look of naïve innocence. "I think they're cute. Don't you think they're cute?"

"Well, yeah, but that's not the—"

"Aaaash!" Nowi yells from somewhere behind me. "Come and play! Come and play!"

"Don't keep the little Manakete lady waiting, yeah?" Anna grins and winks at me. "Go and play with her."

…why did you have to make it sound like innuendo?

_Why did you interpret it as innuendo?_

"Is that what all this stuff is for?" We gesture to her stall, which has more cat stuff behind her, like that particularly blobby grey cat doll thing. "Are you running a porn stall?"

_Robin's eyebrows go up and she stops examining the tail (which is currently disconnected from the band on her waist)._

"Not all the time." Anna shrugs. "You'd be surprised at what people will pay for these."

I…

I'll take your word for it.

I feel like this is something I'm better off not diving into, so I'll take your word for it.

Most importantly. "You're gonna charge me for this?" I sigh.

"No." Anna grins. "On the house."

…

…

"I feel like she has an ulterior motive for giving these things to us." Robin says as she re-attaches the tail to the band on the waist (bonus points for reattaching it off-center).

It's been ten minutes and I'm already tired. "It's Anna. Since when does she not have an ulterior motive?"

Come to think of it, Nowi might have actually found them first and Anna had to play along to avoid unfortunate implications.

"Oh well…they're pretty cute anyways." Robin says as she fiddles with her cat ears. "They're really soft too." _She then shoots us a sideways glance. _"I take it you accomplished what you came here to do?"

Where'd that come from? "Yeah, more or less…I got what I needed."

"So we stopped you from going home a day early?" Robin laughs. "Sorry about that."

"Meh." I wave it off. "There are far worse ways to spend a day."

"Thanks?" Robin says good-naturedly…if a bit confusedly.

I mean…swimsuit cat Robin. I can't really feel like I wasted a day when I got to see swimsuit cat Robin. And swimsuit cat Nino, Nina, Cherche.

_No love for Nowi and Lissa?_

Well…they do look like kids.

Long story short, eventually Robin peeled Nowi and Lissa from the beach and we headed back home.

_So what happens now?_

Now? Uh…we stay for another day in the castle for formality, and then we go home. Minus one Nowi and plus one Nino.

…

…

…

{ === + === }

Author Notes:

This took a little longer than expected.

(Raise your hand if you expected Ash to pick up what he did?)


	25. Interlude - 6

{ === + === }

.

So it's almost summer now.

It's been a really busy five months since the end of the winter party…and the subsequent visit to Interdimensional Anna. I spent a lot of money.

_We came back with the girls wearing their cat accessories, which…was an interesting experience._

Let's…not talk about it.

Right, so…

First order of business: Nowi's stone is still nowhere to be seen. We're keeping an eye open but considering the fact that Nowi is back in Ylisstol there's not much I can do to coordinate at this point. I've put in a few words with the merchants that travel in and out around the town, but there's been more false alarms than anything else.

Next: we officially moved out of the old house to the retrofitted mansion. We moved everything out, including the underground armory.

The Mansion's conversion to a barracks for our fliers finished sometime in April, and we (I) live in a connected room to it…I think it used to be a stable.

_Nah…it used to be a toolshed. The stables are on the other side of the grounds. We had to demolish it to make room for an annex since the mansion wasn't big enough. The stable is somewhere else now._

Oh yeah. We had to annex a large plot of land outside the walls as well. That piece of land acts as the housing for the mounts and the practice fields for a lot of the air to air exercises.

Our airforce is more or less complete in terms of roster size: We have 40 Pegasus Knights and 20 Wyvern Riders not counting ourselves and Cherche.

I mean…granted, I would've liked to have 40 Wyvern Riders as well, but take the hand we're dealt, and all that.

Since the Mansion is a few hundred factors larger than the old house, Nina's got a job change. She's now my personal attendant instead of a maid (though she still dresses like it) and I had to hire about a hundred new people as staff.

_Butlers, maids, groundskeepers, and squires._

(Un)interestingly enough one of the maids we picked up is actually named Sakuya, and she is good with knives…but only in a cooking sense.

...

What else?

_The Mansion had a large front garden that we opened up to the public as a public park, so there are now a lot of commoners in what used to be a noble-only area. The nobles that lived here are pissed, but we don't really care._

The Workshop has expanded to hold a full carpentry division and we're producing Combat Rigging for the riders at full pace. The Metalworks branch is also busy making munitions…and since business is booming we're getting even more masters from Ferox, Ylisse, Plegia, and the Islands who want to be a part of the system.

I think I have around 2000 people on payroll at this point, not counting combat personnel. We're still producing largely stock Fire Emblem weapons though, and I'm really hating the fact that I don't know how to produce gunpowder…or napalm.

_Why?_

The first retrofitted Destroyer was completed in Mustafa's town back in February (or the local month equivalent). I think it's due to have its equipment installed by next week. It looks like a cross between a modern day Destroyer (sleek and shiny) and a block of wood (a block of wood).

_It's more accurate to say that it is a marriage between the (relatively modern) Fubuki-class Destroyer and the old-age Caravel, with a length and width somewhere around the middle of both types of ships. What's the ship's name?_

Maritime Patrol Vessel (MPV-01) Akatsuki. The second ship is nearing completion. The sailors of the ships are a bit disturbed by the fact that the ships don't have sails and masts, but they're adapting reasonably quickly to a ship powered by propellers.

The Carrier currently being built in our docks is behind schedule though…it's really large and the shipwrights are having a hard time. Even better, the catapult design doesn't work (too much stress on the wooden frame) so we have to go back to the drawing board. One of the Pegasus girls got injured pretty badly when the catapult exploded under her on takeoff.

_So what type of armaments are the Destroyers supposed to have?_

Four large scale rail cannons, anti-aircraft equipment in the form of turreted small railguns, a set of mortar tubes, and a set of torpedo tubes. Obviously not real mortar since I don't actually know how it works…so they're more like rail mortars.

We're abusing the fuck out of the whole electrical acceleration business and skipping over explosive powered devices entirely.

_Compared to an average sailing ship of the age, which, according to the neutral island merchants that do business with both us and Valm, packs up to eight ballistae and rely primarily on archers and fliers…our Destroyers will clean house like nobody's business._

Ship to ship combat in game has always been more about boarding action rather than standoff combat…probably to ensure that the player has a say in what's going on. I didn't think it would actually be true though.

Uh…what else?

We "invented" the printing press, and paid off the debt to Outrealm!Anna by March. She gave us an armored maid outfit which we gave to Nina. Better not to question it.

We also purchased a large warehouse near the Dockyards and turned it into a library. Any booksellers that complained were bought out and we made them work in the library as service personnel.

Our own version of the Great Library fits the role of a Wonder oddly well. Since we have undisputed access to the Printing Press and rapid book production not requiring transcription by hand, the Library filled up with books very, very quickly and by the end of the month (the month of May. The Library came online in April) we're getting a lot of business from scholars and students flocking in from all around the continent…and the islands.

_Well, mostly from the major towns nearby and some of its villages. Also, anyone can buy any book from the library (it'll just take us a while to make one for the customer)._

Due to a spur of the moment idea from Morgan (read: kid loves helping people) the Library also hosts classes for people who want to attend.

Nino, the canonically illiterate mage girl, is a teacher in the Library…she specifically focuses on teaching any of the commonfolk how to read and write.

_She even helped us brush up on our writing, too, since it was never too good to begin with._

Morgan also helps teach reading and writing…and math.

We drop in from time to time with Nina to help with math and science, and the fact that we (effectively the biggest noble in town nowadays) appear in the Great Library every so often helped cement its status as a place where learning takes priority over ranking.

_It also made us more popular with the common folk, too._

Yeah, that too. By now all of the nobles in town are in the "if you can't beat them, join them" mindset and some of them are actually genuinely nice people once they got rid of that aristocracy bullshit.

_We're also still bachelors._

Must we bring that up?

_Yes._

Fiiine.

Politics is a thing that exists.

_You can't weasel your way out of this._

UUUUGH.

All. And I repeat. ALL of the Pegasus Knights want to get into my pants. It… I realize that complaining about having too many potential love interests is quite possibly the most ironic thing I can do considering my status as a fuckin' nerd, but hell.

The reason being that the girls can be loosely divided on two groups of traits: political aspirations, and actual attraction.

By now I'm the de-facto lord of the entire Feroxi western coast, and my connections to Mustafa and Basilio (as well as the fact that I give no fucks about religious alignment) have made me the most influential man…pretty much on the western half of the continent.

Because of this (and, obviously, the whole 'bachelor' business) I've been getting a lot of wedding offerings because the families behind every girl wants a piece of that massive influence (and wealth) pie.

…Which brings us back to the Pegasus Knight girls. All of them are daughters of minor and major noble houses (I wish I can say 'we hired peasant girls and are training them to be knights' but honestly we don't have the time nor expertise to train a girl up from a civilian to a full blown knight at all) and all of them have a political reason to get me to fall for them.

_The girls can really be categorized in four fields: Those who like us and care, those who don't like us but must, those who like us and don't care for politics, and those who give no fucks._

The last group is the best group, because they just enjoy flying and kicking ass and taking names. Almost all of the aces of our entire outfit are from the last group.

The second group is the funniest group, since their attempts are all so amazingly halfhearted it's endearing. One of them brought a cat into the mansion since she _hated _cats but figured that I might've liked them.

_We love cats with a burning passion so she's now our favorite person (in a non-love interest kind of way)._

While we're on the subject, the majority of the Wyvern Knights are men. They're also all nobility and are all primarily interested in getting the Pegasus knights to like them.

I wish for their success.

I think that's…it?

_Risen._

…right.

The Risen have multiplied.

I don't know how. I don't know why. One night there was just suddenly more of them. More than usual, I mean.

"Boss, there's another issue with the Slums they want you to check out." Severa says through my door.

"Right, I'll be right there."

Severa tagged along with us. I assume it's because maintaining cover is easier when she isn't liable to run into her mother every day.

But yeah, with the Great Library and the Expanded Workshop and the Expanded Dockyard and the Trade With Mustafa, the town is developing at an alarmingly fast rate. It's gotten to the point where the slums on the southwest section of town (not really slummy but still a crummy place to live) need to be fully reclaimed. It's an operation that I'm paying for out of my own (now very, VERY deep) pockets.

_Like the other nobles that hate me are SO MAD because I've made more money in a year than most of them have done in their lifetimes, and the peasantry looks the other way when it comes to how much money I have._

It's because I actually invest my money, instead of just hoarding it.

Uh…where was I?

Right. The Risen. The rapidly increasing amount of Risen.

Anyways, I don't have any substantial evidence, but based on information from Severa and my own conjectures, it is…well, it seems as if the Risen never die.

They only sleep for a year.

…

…

…

The Risen Resurgence was a force felt throughout both continents. In a striking turn of events, the Ylissean mainland was less hurt despite having more Risen to kill, while Valm was practically paralyzed due to the sudden influx of vapor undead.

The reason to this was…during the first year, the Valmese army was perfectly able to steamroll through the Risen while continuing their death march, while during the same year the Ylissean continent was caught off guard by the sudden Undead everywhere while fighting a much more even war.

During year two, however, the Valmese army is overtaxed trying to pacify the continent, while the Ylissean mainland has every town fully capable of sorting out their own attackers (up to a degree). Thus, despite the increase in Risen numbers (the ones being killed reviving plus newcomers) Ylisse held out much better.

…

[Other Places]

…

Virion and Gaius were able to collect a lot of information on cities and their defensive strengths before the increase in Risen activity. After the Risen amount increased, however, they were unable to do any more, and left Valm by the end of May.

…

The Rebels in Valm had a much easier job: they just focused on leading the swarms of Risen whenever they showed up to the Valmese garrisons and let whatever happens afterwards happen. This had the side effect of making the local populace hate the garrisons whenever they failed to win against the Risen forces and granted the Rebels the chance to play heroes.

Naturally this plan had a downside: quite a few times the Risen would overwhelm the garrisons and the towns, causing the wholesale loss of the town or village in question.

…

Ylisstol's Fast Reaction Cavalry (led by Sully) and the Shepherds (led by Chrom) had more jobs to do due to the increase in Risen activity. Though the individual villages were able to take care of themselves to a degree, more often than not the swarms of Risen ravaging the countryside required a professional's touch to handle.

In other news, Ylisse's projected tax income is expected to nosedive, and nobody has figured out how the Risen are setting fires yet.

…

Ferox: See Ylisstol and Valm and put it somewhere in the middle.

_Feroxi khans have more troops to deploy and each individual Khan covers a smaller area than the Valmese army, but as a result the individual villages are less capable at dealing with the threats than their Ylissean counterparts._

…

Plegia's people: Screwed. Grima's people: Pretty okay.

Plegia was largely spared from the Risen threat last year, and thus the influx of undead this year killed literally everyone.

_Figuratively._

If the Risen showing up had an upside, it would be that they acted as a common enemy for the Plegian Generals (sans Mustafa) and Plegia became a unified nation again almost overnight.

Mustafa's territory, it should be noted, was now considered an independent state in all but name along with Ash's territory.

…

Everyone: With the increase in Risen activity, banditry has gone up as the major towns dig in to weather the storm. The effects of the increased banditry is different in each continent, with the ones with a more mobile force (Ylisse, Plegia) doing better than ones that had other, more pressing worries (Valm).

...

[Ash, again – Town Slums]

…

"Alright, what's the problem this time?" Ash asks as soon as he sees Severa escorting a pair of local town militiamen.

The two men exchange uncomfortable glances. "Your highness, it's not a problem per-se, Lady Severa may have overreacted when—" Ash held up a hand. "Sorry, sir…but it's just squatters again."

"You called me for squatters?" Ash glances at Severa with a raised eyebrow.

"I believe I was right to do so, Boss." Severa nods.

"Alright. Let's go." Ash shrugs.

…

[1st Person Camera]

…

If it's Severa, then she has a damn good reason for calling me out for squatters.

For the record, our policy for squatters has usually been "convert them to tax-paying workers" by giving them decently paid jobs in the Workshop or Shipyard, so these kind of things usually resolve by themselves pretty quickly. With that in mind, having Severa call us out for something like this means that the person doing the squatting is highly unusual.

In any case…we arrive at the rundown house that the squatter is squatting in.

The houses around it have either been torn down or are in the process of being torn down, so it really sticks out.

Let's see…

_We go inside. In the furthest room away from the door was…_

A…bundle of rags? Whatever it is it's not looking at me.

"Luna, cover me." I say before I approach the rags. I don't smell anything besides dust, so whatever it is isn't biological and dead.

"Got it, boss." Severa pulls out a light crossbow and aims it at the rags.

_We approach the bundle of rags and poke it a few times._

…

…

So as it turns out it was actually just a bundle of rags.

The two guys, however, were adamant that there was something else there, and judging by their description whatever it was had some very odd characteristics.

_If we didn't know better we'd think that the two of them were drunk off their asses at nine in the morning._

On one hand I want to smack the both of them for making me come down here for something that didn't resolve to anything important, but on the other hand I'm worried that there actually _was _a something there and now it's loose in the town.

Better safe than sorry, right? "Luna, tell the town guards to watch for any suspicious movement. If they see something unusual, tag it with a stunner if they can." A stunner is a spear with a hollow tip. The tip has a piece of spell paper inside it that uses sound based magic.

"I think they were just drunk." Severa shrugs. "It's not like it's the first time they've said something stupid."

True. "I'd rather not get blindsided because of assumptions." I respond. "Get it done, please?"

"Aye aye, boss." Severa snaps a salute and leaves.

Hmm…Severa made the final decision to call me out here. Game!Severa was willing to dive into a Bandit fortress just to talk one villager out of being killed by the good guys, so maybe there's something else out here?

…

…

There was…kind of. After poking around for an hour or so we found out that one of the overseers responsible for rebuilding the slum area into something more habitable was pocketing the money we were giving him.

He has since been arrested. He also overpowered the guards through sheer surprise factor.

So we shot him in the balls. We missed by a little bit.

He is now whimpering in the jail cell in the guard barracks, largely because one of the guards is constantly aiming a crossbow at his nuts just in case he decides to pull some bullshit again.

The guard is known for having a twitchy trigger finger.

"Why didn't you just tell me?" I ask Severa on our way back home.

"The boss is too active when it comes to hunting down idiots." Severa grins. "So if I had told you he would've found out when you went to the Slums with your full combat gear."

…

Fair point. I only carried a small rail gun (standard issue for all air force units) into the slums. Plus my sword, but nobody cares about a sword.

_We pass by the town square and the largest Inn in the town before_

"Yo!" I hear someone loudly exclaim right as I hit the ground due to a large hand being applied to my back.

"Hi, Basilio." I say into the floor.

"Did I hit you too hard?" Basilio glances at his hand. "Sorry about that."

_Severa looks to Basilio and to us on the ground worriedly, as if to ask herself "should I be doing something here?"_

She eventually settles for a polite "good afternoon, Khan Basilio."

"Good afternoon to you too, lady." Basilio replies equally politely. "Your roster of girls just keep on getting bigger." He says to me.

"I noticed." I get up and dust myself off. "What brings you out here? Is your hibernation over?"

"Yeah, it's finally gotten warm outside." Basilio laughs. "I came out here to see what you were doing, Khan-to-be."

What? "I hope that was a joke." I frown.

"It's half and half." Basilio grunts. "A lot of people back home are talking about you looking to become a Khan. I know you've been rallying power alarmingly fast, but it didn't feel like you."

Hmm… "I'm happy with what I've got. Leave me out of the politics business."

Basilio looks relieved, if only a little. "I'll take that as your official response."

"Yeah, and…" I hear a bell. "Tower! Report!" I yell upwards.

_The Biggest Inn also has a tall tower with a large spyglass for observation purposes._

"Unflagged ships offshore! Possibly hostile!" The man in the tower yells back.

…

Wait, wait, stop panicking. Chapter 12 has to happen before 14. This is probably the invasion from 12. Stay focused…also, stop the people from panicking.

_The people walking the streets are making one hell of a fuss. They've never had a naval threat before._

We fire a loud, whistling flare into the sky and grab the attention of everyone around us.

_We tap our pocket spellbook._

"Don't panic! Have a little faith in us, yeah?" Our voice is magically amplified, so everyone around could hear it just fine. "Garrison! Move and secure equipment for anti-ship combat. Tower, keep watch on enemy ship movements and alert us if they make any sudden moves. Ours is a coastal city, attacks from the waters is just a part of life. Let's do this right."

"Impressive." Basilio notes as the civilians all calm down and move quickly with purpose. "Your influence in the town wasn't just all rumors."

"Safety first and all that." I turn to Severa. "Severa, contact Cherche and have our air force ready to sally."

…

Oh shit I called her Severa.

_She salutes as if nothing happened and quickly runs off._

"Where are you going?" Basilio asks (and follows) us.

"Home, I need to make some preparations."

…

…

So, combat equipment.

We have our smaller rail guns which is standard issue for all air units.

All standard Pegasus knights get a lance, a set of javelins, and their Combat Rigging that can hold up to four munitions.

All standard Wyvern knights get the same plus a Poleaxe, but their Combat Rigging can only hold up to two munitions.

We also have special corps, and the special corps is what we're going home for.

…

_We practically ran back to our mansion._

"Nice place." Basilio mutters as we cross the threshold.

"Head maid!" I call out.

_The head maid a nice old lady…also, terrifying if you cross her. She has control of the mansion._

"Yes, Sir?" She bows politely.

"Are the Blackbird girls up yet?"

She huffs. "I know you're bad with names, sir Ash, but an effort should be made nevertheless."

"Sorry, sorry, but right now we're in a bit of a pinch." I smile sheepishly.

"We saw, boss." One of the girls comes into view. "They have six ships in the water."

For those wondering, the Blackbird girls are so named because they fulfill the role of the SR-71 Blackbird. That is, they scout. The girls in question have exceptionally sharp eyes and use the snapshot tomes to get an unprecedented view of the battlefield.

_The reason why they're SR-71s instead U-2s is because their Combat Riggings are designed to brace and hold a set of six Cruise Engines instead of two…and because the Blackbird is just a cool plane in general. In order to distinguish the girls they were given small black capes (complete with eagle image) that drape over one shoulder._

"Two are definitely transports, and the other four are escorts." The girl gives me a picture. I think she's Sorano. "I think there's around two, three hundred men on those ships."

_We should have the maids put the girl's names on their capes._

"Definitely scouts then." Basilio says. "Odds are they're carrying more supplies than men…"

"But if it's Valm, then those troops are probably good." Now that I think about it, this is weird. I heard that Valm was having issues with dealing with Risen in their continent, so if that was the case then why did they send out a scouting force?

"If it's Valm then the bulk of the force on that ship is probably cavalry." Basilio corrects me. "Might explain why they're so light on manpower."

"Well…we're not counting on any oarsman they might have under the deck." Sorano? Amends. "So their actual combat power is a bit higher. Um…" She looks between me and Basilio.

"Ash, you have command." Basilio clarifies.

Not that I expected any differently. "Alright." Looks like the other Blackbird girl is here. "Blackbirds, I need you girls to act as mission control, so bring flares when you go up."

Both of them salute cutely, and I feel really bad for not knowing their names.

_Physically they represent Thany from Fire Emblem 6. Both of them._

"Anyways." I leave the mansion and see Magna all rigged up and ready to go, with Cherche sitting on Minerva next to him. "That was fast."

_Cherche and Magna were the only two Wyvern/Wyvern riders in attendance. Other than her, there were eight mounted Pegasus knights with a few dozen nondescript crewmen wheeling out bombs from the mansion's armory._

"Luna is a fast runner." Cherche smiles. "Her mastery of those jet boots is even better than yours."

Severa's really good with the wind-enchanted shoes...to the point where she can freely scale walls with them. It's pretty cool to see, actually...I can only scale walls if I hit it just right.

_If Severa here translated to game terms she would be all sorts of broken: Increased move, Can walk through enemies, Indefinite Galeforce…_

"Of all of our forces, only the Gripen and Rafale forces are available for action…or rather, we have limited ammunition and those two are the best squadrons so far." Cherche reports…so we have eight fliers besides ourselves.

"You have an odd naming sense, Ash." Basilio notes.

"Says you and literally everyone else." I roll my eyes. "That's good enough. What do we have?"

"Four torpedoes and four…uh…fletchettes."

Hmm…Both squadrons of four are Pegasus knights, and they don't really have the flight ceiling to make full use of the fletchette bombs.

_More importantly, the Fletchette bombs are pretty useless against ships._

"We should have one or two AFMs ready, though." Nina joins in the conversation.

_Since changing jobs, Nina's acting as our quartermaster. Odds are she'll fulfill this role for when the campaign against Valm starts for real._

"What's an AFM?" Basilio frowns at me.

"Anti-Fortress Munition." I explain. "Against ships they should work fine; bring them out."

"But their igniters…" Cherche points out.

"It'll be fine." I reassure her. "Give me the AFMs, The Rafales will handle one Fletchette each, and the Gripens will take the torpedoes."

"If you say so." Cherche sighs. "Crewmen, please start working. Mount one AFM on both Minvera and Magna, please."

…

[Valm Warships]

…

"So that's the rising Jewel of the Coast." Dalton, the captain of the expeditionary force, said as he observed the coastline through his spyglass. "It's quite something."

"To have built a no-name coastal town up to the center of the Feroxi coast, whoever this Ash is is pretty impressive." His lieutenant noted. "I've heard of plenty of rumors surrounding him, and none of them make any sense to me."

"So he's just like Basilio?" Dalton laughed. "Morons, the lot of them."

"If I may." Dalton's strategist chips in. "The rumors surrounding this 'Ash' character concerning his martial prowess paint him as an incredibly flexible fighter and commander…we should approach with caution."

"He's just a half-wit mage." His lieutenant snaps. "All we need to do is to get him in sword reach and he'll die like a little bitch."

"Enough." Dalton stops his advisors. "Looks like we've got their attention."

"The girls with the black capes again?" The strategist looked to the air with his own spyglass. "Were they just out to scout us the first time?"

"Looks like they're more organized this time around." The lieutenant noted. "They brought friends, too."

"Ten air units…but their shapes are odd." The strategist agreed. "Some kind of combat equipment, I suppose?" He looked to Dalton. "Your orders, sir."

"Ready the archers." Dalton said simply. "Heroes don't live long in wars."

"Yes sir."

…

[Good Guys™]

…

"Doesn't look like the ships are friendly." Cherche notes. "Ash, your orders."

_Six ships…clustered fairly close together. _Ash mulls it over. _I don't have anything resembling targeting electronics, so dropping a precision target bomb from out of arrow range is literally impossible._

"Blackbirds!" Ash calls out. "Relay pointers!"

The two Blackbird girls dutifully fire flares into the air.

…

…

"Flares? During the day?" Dalton's strategist raised an eyebrow. "Is their captain a moron?"

"They came out here with ten units. They're morons." The Lieutenant snickered. "What are they going to do with just flares?"

…

…

"I see flares." Basilio squints. "I assume they have some meaning."

"That they do, sir." Morgan nods. "Alright, guys! Prepare for the first volley!"

The twenty sets of large scale rail guns arrayed on the coastline raised their barrels as one.

"I think I got my math right." Morgan mumbled, checking his notebook one more time. "Oh well. Not like we're actually going to hit them from all the way out here." The ships they were targeting were just specks on the horizon. "Stagger your shots, fire away!"

…

"The shit?!"

Dalton's two words captured the situation fairly well.

The situation being: the ocean suddenly exploding around the ships.

"Report!" Dalton roared.

"We're being shot at!" His Lieutenant pointed out the obvious.

"They're shooting at us from somewhere!" The Strategist followed suit.

"No shit! Where are they shooting at us from?!" Dalton looked to the skies, and saw…nothing.

The waters around them exploded again.

"One of our ships have been hit!" The Strategist said as the deck of one of the smallest ships exploded in woodchips and blood. "It's taking on water!"

_A single shot?! Impossible! _Dalton's face contorted into fury. "Alert all ships! Charge and strike at the enemy town!"

"They can't possibly be shooting at us from that far out!" The Lieutenant flinched as something zipped by his face very quickly, taking a piece of the ship's deck with it as the bullet-or whatever it was-shattered against the ocean surface.

"But we're being fired on!" The Strategist snapped. "Those girls up there must be directing the attack! Archers! Fire! Fire up there!"

"You won't reach!" The Lieutenant snapped as the ships cut their anchor and the oars men rowed with all of their strength.

"Mages! Unfurl sails and bring us to their shores!" Dalton commanded.

_Using wind magic to power the sails is a common occurrence on the high seas for the major militaries of the Fire Emblem universe._

_..._

"Ash, the ships are moving." Cherche says. "It's time for us to make a move too."

"Yeah." Ash nods. "Alright, we're going to make our attack run! Gripens will target the ships, Rafales will target the decks! Cherche, you're with me."

Cherche nods.

"Blackbirds, send the signal to cease fire!" Ash said as Magna turned lazily in the air to find a good angle of approach. "All units, strike!"

…

…

"They've stopped shooting at us." Dalton's Lieutenant notes as the explosions subside. "Did they run out of ammo?"

"Probably; I can't imagine producing those spellbooks on any large level." The Strategist said. "What the…" He looked up. "Shit. Dalton! The fliers are gone! Only those black caped girls are left!"

"What?!" Dalton looks up to confirm then scans the skies. "Archers, look alive!"

The Lieutenant blinked when he noticed something else in the water. "Oy, look over there. There are ropes in the water."

"Ropes? What do you mean, ropes?" Dalton demanded, following his Lieutenant's finger to four streaks of white headed towards their ship.

…

Everyone aboard the ship (who could see it) watched with fascination as the white ropes in the water made contact with the ship's hull. That fascination quickly turned into horror as explosions rocked the boats again, and the horror quickly turned into panic as the struck ships started to list into the water.

"We…we might want to consider surrendering." Dalton's Lieutenant said faintly.

"We still have two more ships left and the enemy shoreline is well within reach." Dalton snaps. "I will not let these honorless curs defeat me!"

"Honor or not, they have you whipped." His Strategist mutters. "Heads up, one of their Wyverns is over our heads."

…

Ash looked down with a slight frown as the arrows fired by the archers uselessly flew back down. "Well, they get points for trying." He said.

_If this ship is shooting at me then diving at it would be suicidal. _He thought. _So let's target the other large ship instead._

…

"He's diving at the other ship!" Dalton snarled. "What can he possibly hope to do by himself?!"

"Sink it?" The Lieutenant said dryly as the Wyvern rider pulled out of the dive. "Looks like he dropped something."

The two of them watched as the small something dropped from the Wyvern hit the ship…and then nothing happened.

…

_Was it a dud? _Ash thought as he pulled away from the ship spewing arrows everywhere. _Nah, let's wait and see for a bit._

Waiting and seeing paid off: the ship began to smoke from the inside out and then quickly burst into flames.

"So whatever he dropped was a firebomb?! Dammit!" Dalton picked up a bow and notched an arrow. "You have no honor, Wyvern Knight!" He yelled into the sky. "Fight us on equal grounds, and we'll show you what a real man looks like!"

"I'm the only guy in the air right now though." Ash sighed, watching Cherche dive down towards Dalton's ship while they were distracted with him.

…

…

Basilio watched the last ship go under and gave a low whistle. "That's…quite impressive."

"Isn't it?" Morgan snapped his fingers. "Long range engagement. All of the victory with none of the casualty…as Boss calls it. I need to get the ships going." He bounces away even before he finished speaking.

"Going? Going where?" Basilio calls after him.

"SAR!" Morgan yells back.

Basilio shares a confused glance with the operator manning the turret next to him. "What's an SAR?"

…

…

[1st Person Camera]

…

…

So, that went way better than I expected. No munitions failed, no deployment issues…nobody on our side got hit…if we had this kind of equipment in game, do we get experience for the kills? I mean, I'm pretty sure I killed like 200 people with one bomb back there.

_Probably less: a lot of the crewmembers of the ship we sunk bailed out into the ocean. Judging by the tremendous lack of organization it can be assumed that the majority of them don't know how to swim._

Hmm…oh?

_The Akatsuki, along with a few of the smaller trade ships, have left port and are headed towards the combat area. The Akatsuki, despite how large it is, is the fastest ship in the makeshift fleet._

I guess Morgan deployed them?

_We indicate to all of the fliers and dive down to land on the ship._

"General!" the captain of the ship salutes. Also, I feel like my rank is inflating. "Per Morgan's suggestions, we're out here to do Search and Rescue."

Yeah, thought so. "Understood, we'll assist. Cherche, grab the other fliers."

_We tie rescue equipment to our combat rigging and take off again._

The 'rescue equipment' is literally just rope. We drop rope onto people in the water. They grab on, and we lead them to the nearest boat.

It's not like we can't fly the people to the boats, but uh…during practice we've overestimated the grip of the people holding onto rope and slammed more than one guy into the ship they were supposed to land on.

_In one particular instance we underestimated how well our rescuee was at climbing and dropped him so far off ground he missed the deck of the ship entirely and landed in the water again. That has turned into a game the knights play with the town kids on their down time._

Anyways, rescue, rescue…

…

…

…

At the end of the rescue operation, we picked up maybe eighty people. None of them looked like officers, but then again being in water has the interesting habit of causing people to strip off their armor, so…

"Well, now what?" I look to Cherche. "I didn't actually expect to fish up anyone alive."

"Really?" Cherche sighs. "How reliable of you. Captain, please return to port; I imagine that most of these men will be more than happy to return to their homelands."

_So she thinks we picked up primarily the crew, not the soldiers._

I'm a little bit wary about sending these guys home, to be honest. If they get picked up by Valm and spill the beans we're going to be in for a much, much tougher fight in the future.

_Rebuttal: the amount of people who witnessed this fight, even if at a distance, amounts to THE ENTIRE TOWN._

…oh yeah. I guess that's a valid point.

…

_We sort out the post-battle issues with Basilio's help. Ultimately we released all the prisoners we took._

I would've liked to hold a ransom for at least a few of them, but…meh, nothing wrong with taking the moral high ground every now and then.

_We also got a request from Basilio to explain all of our weapons to him._

Uh…what is there to be said?

So…we currently have three types of ammunition that our air units use. All the Pegasus Knights can mount up to four at once, but if they do they effectively lose all air combat capability, so we stick with two unless they're using torpedoes.

The Torpedoes have a soft iron head with a metal tube body. It's propelled forward by a propeller spun with wind magic. Compared to the real torpedoes used by the Earth military it's a lot slower and a lot lighter. What makes our Torpedoes useful is the fact that it contains two spell circles (we usually use Arcfire and Arcthunder) loosely separated by a string. When the torpedo hits a boat the impact force drives the spell papers together, and since spells go kaboom when they come together…

_The force of the explosion will tear the iron head to pieces and drive it into the ship's hull, hopefully ripping it a hole large enough for sharks to swim through._

We're currently working on increasing the torpedo's speed so the damage it deals isn't dependent on how hard we cross our fingers.

_Next is…_

The Fletchette bombs that we didn't use on the ships. It was a good call by the Rafale girls too, since the Fletchettes were designed against ground targets to begin with…I'm also pretty sure that using these bombs on ships would constitute a war crime.

Anyways, the Fletchette bombs are half Fletchette, half Self-Forging Munition. The bombs are stocky and their tips are fragile. When released, there's about a five second delay (Morgan worked this part out) before the bomb is suddenly stopped in midair via a blast of wind (kind of like VTOL thrusters). Spell papers collide, and the relatively fragile body goes kaboom.

_We're relying very hard on the whole spell papers go kaboom thing._

After bomb goes kaboom, the payload of sharp metal fragments gets separated and flies everywhere (but mostly downwards) onto the unfortunate enemies below them. When dropped at low altitude the shrapnel is hurty and harmy and painy, but when dropped at a high altitude (largely achievable only by Wyverns since they have a higher flight ceiling) the shrapnel pieces heat and forge into molten metal droplets, and then it's pretty much burning metal rain from that point.

The biggest downside to the bomb is the fact that it's coverage area is too wide compared to how much shrapnel it drops, but if we have twenty Wyverns carpeting a single area we should be able to cover for that weakness no problem.

_"No army on the ground can fight something like that, I suppose." Basilio had commented._

The third weapon is the Anti-Fortress-Munition, the AFM. This is my proudest work.

_Even though we can't claim intellectual rights on it._

We can't really claim rights on the idea that things can burn.

Anyways. The AFM physically represent a guided penetration bomb (The GBU-24) with a supple wooden body, but with a reinforced drill attached to the head powered by (what else?) wind magic in the bomb's body. The drill doesn't have the force required to do any real bunker bustering (so we can't just lob it onto a castle and expect it to work) but against light emplacements it…actually I'm pretty sure if I dropped it onto a house it would go through the roof and then Chrom will kill me.

Ahem.

The bomb is filled with oil and tinder, and while the bomb is dropping it is also spinning, and while it is spinning it a piece of flint connected to the spinning center is being rapidly struck onto a grooved iron band built in the center of the bomb. The effect is not unlike taking a stick of wood onto a chain-link fence and listening to it go "tink tink tink tink"

Speaking objectively, this grooved iron band is why this bomb is both good and bad. When the bomb is produced, it is kept as airtight as possible based on currently (Fire Emblem Universe) available technologies, so the bomb doesn't ignite early when it's still being dropped.

_Shit can't burn when there's no O2._

We don't have the tools to build a completely airtight body, so air eventually does seep in and the mixture will ignite, and then…if it's on the ground, it blows up and scatters hot oil everywhere. Well, ok, it doesn't really "blow up" but we put a sound-based spell in the middle to hurry the process up.

_More on that later._

So in a small, enclosed area like a peasant house, everything inside it catches on fire, everyone inside it catches on fire, and the house then burns to the ground with everyone inside of it. Same for any structure that has combustible components, this bomb will take it down disgusting fast.

_It is worse when the bomb head malfunctions after hitting a house roof and detaches: the oil from the bomb will leak out while on fire so now suddenly there's just a pillar of fire inside the house, before it detonates and then there's suddenly a blanket of fire inside the house._

It is…far worse, when it detonates in the air though.

When the sonic spell goes off, the burning oil is spread over a wide area. The fact that we use an oil mix that burns for surprisingly long (though not as long as petrol) ensures that if a bomb goes off prematurely EVERYONE in the impact area will suffer severe burns, if not die outright.

I'm not optimistic enough to believe that the Shepherds (hell, my squadron included) will be able to walk through a charred field filled with nothing but burned corpses and resist the urge to stab me in the back.

If the positions were reversed (Me serving under someone who just napalmed a village) I'd backstab him in a heartbeat, so…for that reason, we're trying to make the bomb of mass destruct safer.

_"Here's to hoping you succeed." Basilio had commented._

_Now, about the sonic spells._

Right, right.

We obtained the Megaphone tome and the Snapshot tome from Anna at a steep (but reasonable!) price. Almost immediately upon getting them I tore them to ribbons to figure out the spell circles.

Fucking hell Outrealm Anna is a genius. One page of the megaphone spell is a concentric 15 layer circle, and the spell doesn't even work until four pages are used together.

_To give you an idea, Morgan can use five Fire spells for one page, and it's at best a circle plus a little extra per page._

Snapshot was, surprisingly enough, easier. It takes around 3 pages (17 layer spell circle) to 'take' the picture, and the rest of the 17 pages (24 layer spell circle per page) to turn the 'stored data' into a physical picture.

Incidentally, the above is why we brought the printing press to fruition. It took me around 3 weeks to make one charge of the Megaphone spell. The book she sold me was good for 20 charges.

_Also incidentally, our handwriting has gotten a lot neater as a result of needing to make 4 point font with our bare hands._

No wonder Anna wanted more per book.

Oh well, difficulty of spell reproduction aside, the entire point of having those two spells were to learn how to manipulate and how to manipulate sound.

The sonic blast spell is the first fruit.

…

I had to mix it with the logic behind wind spells, but what it does is it creates an explosive force around a small localized area. It hits harder than its equivalent (Wind), too.

_But it has no range._

…

Yeah, that. None of us can figure out how to turn it into a ball projectile so the spell detonates as soon as it leaves the caster's (usually mine) hand.

With that in mind, I can't really advance on the combat front any more beyond the Sonic Blast.

_To be fair, it in itself is already plenty deadly. We embedded a pair of sonic blast spell pages into a pair of gauntlets._

Oh yeah, I forgot about that. Sending shockwaves into someone's body really sucks for that someone. At low output it fucks with their ears and they can't stand up straight anymore, and at high outputs we shatter their bones entirely. With successive pummels we stop their hearts from beating and their lungs from working, so on, so forth.

If I had any confidence in my Close Quarters Combat I'd switch to gauntlets permanently, but I don't, so I won't.

…

The light based spells haven't created anything tremendously useful yet. The only thing we have so far is…

Wait. Back up.

I delved into dark magic…only got as far as Flux and Nosferatu though.

Anyways, one of the fundamental aspects of dark magic is "knowledge", which is a little different from anima (fire, thunder) which is…uh…

_Nino explained it as "unity."_

There's never been a full scientific study for magic, so it's a little hard to put it into words. In the most simple senses, a mage's ability to use anima magic depends heavily on how well they…er, can use anima magic. It's kind of why anima spell books are all tiered (thunder, elthunder, arcthunder, thoron), the reason being so mages can quickly and easily adapt to using more power without needing to drastically learn a new skillset.

_To put it in a different way, using anima magic just requires picking up a spellbook and going through it via trial and error; having an understanding makes it go faster, but it is entirely possible to brute-force the learning process._

Dark magic is different from a fundamental aspect. In order to use it there has to be an innate understanding of how the spell works before the spellbook will actually work for you…on that note, dark magic spell circles are deceptively threadbare in how much content they have.

_For the record, we ARE guessing at best when it comes to these things. Documentation's pretty hard to come by when it comes to spellbooks._

So, Flux. Flux's basis is an understanding of geology…the more you understand the moment of the earth, the more powerful the spell is.

_It's not pure scientific knowledge either, which throws us off a little bit. Either way, we can use a Flux that hits with the impact force of a Richter 6 earthquake, and all of it concentrated in the body of the poor sap that we're shooting at._

Nosferatu works on an understanding of biology. We also hit pretty hard with this spell.

_Nosferatu deals damage according to which body parts we're hitting…for us, we usually aim for the tendons, muscles, and then nerves, in that order._

Can't move, can't scream, can't breathe. All you can do is feel pain in every part of your body before slowly choking to death. I love Nosferatu. I don't understand how the "heal" component of the spell works at all though, so I don't get that benefit.

_We know that it is 'absorbing' something, but actually healing from it is another matter entirely._

Maybe I should invite Tharja? Seems like she'd know…or Henry, we…I can't imagine Henry sitting down and teaching, so maybe not.

Well, whatever. The point of this detour is that we figured out how to reproduce the 'absorb' mechanic from Nosferatu, and even though the 'stolen energy' or whatever the hell it is is entirely bled off into the atmosphere, it's still viable as a sub-component in a lot of spells.

To that end, with the absorption mechanic mixed along with some of the preliminary research into light manipulation magic means that the barding we use for Pegasus knights give them a certain measure of invisibility. I don't think we'll get to the point where the horses are literally invisible, plus it's not invisibility, but rather forcing the people observing them to fail a spot check if they're not paying attention, but every little bit helps…plus the fact that the spell paper has to be inserted into the barding with the spirit dust mixture makes it a fair amount heavier. Hmm…

_Maybe we should just reserve it for the Halloween girls?_

I can see it helping them a lot, so that might be a good idea.

For the record, the Pegasus Knight girls are given the following squadron designations: Rafale, Gripen, Typhoon, Mirage, Tomcat, Hornet, Fulcrum, Tornado, Blackbird, and Halloween, with the last two being special op units.

_Some of the names were taken like Eagle, Falcon, etc. And some other names would've gotten our asses kicked (like Warthog, despite how amazing the A-10 is)._

All of them have the cute little over-one-shoulder capes with emblems that denote their squadron affiliations. The Blackbirds are the only ones with a specially colored cape, though.

_The Halloween girls are so named because they fulfill the roles of the AC-130U, and denoting their squadron as "Spooky" would've, y'know, gotten our asses kicked._

The Halloween girls are all tiny...they kind of need to be though, considering how much equipment they pack.

_One anti-ship railgun, one rapid fire rail repeater, One fletchette potato gun, plus a fair amount of spare ammunition. Yeah, they have a pretty heavy loadout…hell, their Pegasi carry pretty much four girl's worth of weight._

Nino (plus two or three master smiths) figured out the preliminary design needed for a rapid loader. It can fire three or four shots very quickly, but it's a start.

…

So what do we do now?

"Basilio, do you think Valm is going to come after us seriously from now on?" I ask him.

_This is the day after us sinking the ships, we're at lunch._

"If what you did to their ships become common knowledge, no." Basilio grunts. "With that said, I know Valm has had a lot of trouble with the Risen at home, so them coming here makes no sense to begin with."

'I know', huh? Sounds like he's got spies on the ground. Still, why's Valm doing this?

…why did Valm invade the good guys to begin with?

…

Oh.

Oh Shit.

"Looks like you know something." Basilio comments.

"Yeah…well, I think so." I say slowly. "Basilio, would it be possible for you to lend me troops?"

"Not in a million years." Basilio laughs. "Is it that bad?"

"It…uh. It could potentially be bad. If you can't lend me troops then lend me some officers and drillmasters."

Basilio shakes his head. "I'll see what I can do…but odds are you'll have to pay for them out of pocket yourself."

I wave it off. "That's fine; I have some pretty deep pockets nowadays."

"So I heard." Basilio raises an eyebrow. "How deep are your pockets nowadays? You've been doing this for almost a year."

Uh…Let's see.

"I think I have around eight hundred grand in raw funds, the Great Library is worth around five hundred grand, the Workshop is somewhere around a million…trade with Mustafa is around four hundred, and the Dockyard is around a hundred thousand." Or thereabouts…I don't have (and am not) a professional accountant, so the estimates are very roughly based on the income we're paying out in taxes to the town...huh? Basilio seems to be frozen.

_Total tally: almost 3 million gold._

"You ok?"

…He's making words with his mouth but no sounds are coming out.

"How do you have that much money?!" Basilio demands. "Where is your gold mine?!"

Uh. "Well, we make good things and we make a lot of them." I shrug. "That's all there is to it."

"You should work as our economic advisor." Basilio sighs. "We would have an infinite amount of money then."

"I don't think it would work out." I laugh. "I'm only successful because the average person trusts me." And because the people I hired are all upstanding badasses.

"Well…I'll send you some candidates. What do you have in mind with trainers?" Basilio asks (and takes a snack from a tray Nina gives us).

"Improved ground forces. What else?"

…

…

[Elsewhere]

…

…

A young girl with a pretty red coat sat atop of a rock, watching the hustle and bustle of a mansion being hastily repaired and repopulated.

"Isn't that the mansion I fell into?" She wonders out loud and tries to pat down the strand of hair on her head (to no avail). "They made their base there?"

"Looks like it." Her travelling companion, a frail if angry looking priest, nods. "No sense of décor, the lot of them. What do you plan on doing?"

"I'm going to get Miss Nowi's stone back." The girl hops to her feet and stretches.

"Miss Nowi, not 'Mother', eh?" The priest notes.

"As our Boss says, until we meet, we're not related." The girl (by now I think we all know is Nah) says a little dejectedly. "Besides, my Mother is here." She pats a Dragonstone seated in a pouch on her waist (right side).

"Sounds reasonable enough to me." The priest (Brady) chuckles. "I'll get lunch set up. You gonna be back by then?"

Nah looked at the sky…it was maybe an hour until lunch. "That should be plenty of time." She reached into the pouches around her waist and pulled out both Dragonstones nested within and headed onto the mansion's grounds.

"You're just going to let her go alone?" The merchant responsible for finding the whereabouts of Nowi's dragonstone asked Brady incredulously. "She's just a little girl!"

"Nah? She's fine." Brady replied. "Even without her equipment she can easily take all of us in a fight."

"All of you? All of who?" The merchant demanded.

"Well, just wait and see." Brady passed the merchant a cup of wine.

.

.

.

{ === + === }

Author Notes:

I should probably update more frequently than once per 45 days.

Especially if I want to get this story done before I die of old age.


	26. Interlude - 6x: Nah

{ === + === }

.

Nah's appearance, predictably, did not give her smooth sailing. She was accosted by a Mercenary as soon as she entered into the mansion grounds.

"Who left their kid here?" The Mercenary who saw her first yelled. "Hey, kid. What are you doing here? It's dangerous around these parts."

Nah bows politely. "I've come in search of a special stone. Do you happen to know where it is?" She asks.

"Special stone?" The Mercenary shares a sideways glance with one of his men. "I've seen a lot of special looking stones. Our boss likes collecting jewelry."

"Really? So he might have it then. Would it be possible for me to look?" Nah's poker face of utter innocence made the Mercenary's heart stir. "The stone belonged to my mother."

Wups.

"Are you working with that…would-be Feroxi Noble?" The Mercenary demanded as he unsheathed his blade.

"Who's that?" Nah asked innocently.

"She looks like that little dragon brat, too." One of his men said suddenly. "Except that stupid hair of hers."

Nah flinched. "I like my hair." She mumbles.

"You made her sad, not cool." Another one of the men said, punching the offender good-naturedly on the arm. "Alopogize to the young lady."

"I don't think there's gonna be a problem with looking, captain." A Myrimdon spoke up. "It's not like he's paying us to babysit his treasure."

"No, but I am paying you to be professional." The Big Boss™ snapped. "Get your asses back to your posts."

Nah sized up the man…tall, weighty, carrying a massive sword. Like an overweight, self-deluded middle-aged man…so not all that different from a vast majority of nobility. _At least his arms look defined. _She noted. _He might actually be a problem._

"What do you want to get into my warehouse for, girl?" The noble growled at her. "Though I do take donations."

Nah refrained from narrowing her eyes. "I'm looking for my mother's heirloom, so…" She said diplomatically.

"Oh, so you're related to the idiot brat of a girl who came around here last week?" The man laughed. "To think she had a kid as big as you…didn't expect to see a slut that size." He chortles at his own joke. "I touched a nerve, eh?" He adds as he sees the glare Nah gave him.

"Return my mother's stone, and I will leave you and your mansion unharmed." Nah said coldly, gripping the stones in her hands tightly to relieve a little of the anger.

"The teeth are coming out, eh?" The boss drew his oversized sword with a flourish. "Just go home to your whore of a mother, and—"

Whatever he was going to say next was cut off as a massive scaly tail smacked him into the mansion walls more than a hundred feet away.

"You should learn to mind your tongue." Nah's hands glowed (the stones were glowing and they shined brightly through her palms). The tail coming out from under her dress dissipated as soon as it appeared.

"The boss is…attack! We're under attack!" The Mercenary called out loudly as he rushed towards Nah.

"My business is with him." Nah responded. "Drop your weapons and you may go."

"Fucking hell, kid. We have our pride as mercs!" The Mercenary drew his sword and went in for a jab.

Nah drops the stones back into her pouches (they still glowed with power) and swiped at the sword, snapping it with her bare hands with a loud, metallic shriek.

The Mercenary had time to stare in surprise before a backhand punch from Nah sent him flying.

"What are you waiting for?!" The Noble called out wheezily, standing back up after the sudden meeting of his face and the mansion wall. "What do you think I'm paying you for?!"

_Well…she just punched you across the map. _Most of them thought reluctantly as Nah paced towards the Noble. She stopped when she noticed a squad of Armored Knights walk towards her.

_Since knight is both a rank and a unit class, 'Armored Knight' denotes the unpromoted form of the General unit._

"Let's see you stop us." The leader of the knights said gruffly, hefting his spear at her. "I see that you're no ordinary girl, so pardon me if I refuse to hold back."

Nah's response is to grin savagely and charge at the Knight.

The Knight thrusts his lance at her, but Nah blocks it with her left hand and charges into the spear, crumpling it in her hand before landing and jumping into a spin. With the force of the momentum she rips into the man's armor with her other hand, and with the same metallic shriek the layers of the frontal armor tears away, and with a non-too-gentle tug Nah tears the remaining scraps of armor from its leather bounds and tosses it away.

Naturally, the Knight fell on his ass in his hasty attempt to back the fuck away from the Demonically Powerful Little Red Riding Hood.

Outwardly, Nah still had the savage grin on her face as she turned to the Noble, who squealed in terror and ran to barricade himself inside the mansion.

Inwardly, Nah was feeling extremely guilty about damaging the Knight's armor. Her thought process went something like this: _That armor was really well maintained, it must've cost him a lot and I just tore it to pieces! What if he was just trying to make a living for his kids back home what should I do aaaaa_

Nah shook her head vigorously to clear it. _I just need to tear the mansion down first._ She reassured herself, and walked to the nearest wall.

The tail then appeared from behind her again and she whipped it into the wall with maximum force, demolishing the wall and creating a massive, gaping hole.

"She's a Manakete." The Knight said shakily. "What tremendous power…"

"I've never heard of Manaketes being able to do THAT!" his lieutenant pointed to the shredded bits of the Knight's lance on the ground.

"I've never heard of Manaketes being that cute, either." A knight in the crowd added.

Nah (blushing a little) ignored them as she entered the mansion.

"Uwah…the inside of this place is hideous." Nah coughed. "The only thing he cared about is making the outside pretty."

With that in mind, Nah went around the mansion searching for money.

…

…

…

The merchant/Brady pair looked at the sizable hole in the mansion wall large enough to see even from their vantage point (much further than 100 feet). "Wow, that's pretty impressive." The Merchant whistled.

Brady raised an eyebrow. "I thought you'd be more surprised."

"I do business with the Feroxi East Coast." The trader shrugged. "After seeing something like the inside of the Great Library a little violence doesn't surprise me."

Brady lies back on the ground. _Never heard of something like that…it doesn't sound like the Boss either. _Brady thought. _Then again, this Ash is different from Boss…not that it's too hard to be different from him. _"Oh, look. She's coming back."

"You have some pretty good eyes." The Merchant muttered as he saw a small red figure trot back up the hill. "Welcome back. How was your trip?"

Nah triumphantly tosses a Dragonstone in her hand. "Couldn't be easier…now we just need to get this to Nowi without letting her find out." She sits down on the large cloth Brady set up (picnic time).

Both of them look to the merchant.

"Hey, I'm just here because Sir Ash paid me to be." The merchant holds up his hands in surrender. "My mouth is sealed."

"He figured out where it was?" Brady wondered, handing over a cup of tea to Nah.

"By the sound of things he just threw money everywhere until someone found it." The merchant replied.

Nah and Brady shared a puzzled look. _That doesn't sound like Boss. _They thought simultaneously.

_But then that might be a good thing._ Nah added, sipping her tea. _Brady makes really good tea. _She noted.

A rumble sounded in the distance, and the three of them paused to watch the mansion in the distance collapse into ruins.

"What did you do?" Brady asks tiredly.

"My hand slipped a few times." Nah's reply was entirely nonchalant.

…

…

…

{ === + === }

Author Notes:

Super short gaiden~

So yes, Nah does indeed have two Dragonstones (One she's born with, and one that belongs to Future!Nowi), and she can also draw their power to partially transform.


	27. Interlude - Last

{ === + === }

_Bang._

"So what do you propose!?"

…

Sounds like someone tried to smash a table. Did I walk in on something? Am I walking in on something?

_Basilio sent a messenger a week ago, telling us to gather at the Long Fort because something important was happening._

And so we're here. I think we're the last ones here. Considering how far away we are we probably are the last ones here.

_We being us, Cherche, Nina, Severa. We left Nino and Morgan in charge of the situation at home._

…

Whoever was doing the yelling was doing it in the biggest meeting room…guy's got a good set of lungs, for us to hear him through these very heavy looking doors.

_We knock on the door._

"Enter." I hear Basilio say.

_So we do._

We see a lot of people sitting around a table with a map in the center.

"Ah…Ash the 'noble'." One of the nameless NPCs grunt. "I see you have a penchant for being late."

I see Chrom! Hi Chrom! Robin too!

_We wave to Chrom. Chrom waves back sheepishly._

It didn't look like anyone else was here, so it was just the two of them?

"Flying can only be so fast." I reply. "What's on the table?"

"See here." Robin taps a spot on the map where…wow, that's a lot of pieces. "That's a Risen army we found…fortunately they're simply milling about, but who knows how long that will last."

…

…

_We stare at the pile of units._

This is…this is like if someone took a map from the game of Risk and piled every unit onto one area.

"What's the estimate?" I ask her.

"At least a million Risen."

…

What.

Like…seriously. What.

_How did they get that estimate?_

That's not really the problem here.

"As you can imagine, if an army of that size found a reason to move…Ferox would suffer." Flavia said darkly. "And thus, we are here."

I have many questions.

…?

Upon re-examining the map, it doesn't seem to be the only reason that we're gathered here.

_There's a small cluster of boat pieces at the edge of the map._

"Are we worried about Valm?" I gesture to the cluster of units.

"Supposedly." Basilio grunts. "There's a lot of boats anchored around the Valm coastline…they're probably planning an invasion."

"Their homeland is in shambles, why are they doing something as costly as an invasion now?!" Another nameless NPC growled and slammed his fist on the table.

Because they're trying to cut the zombies at the source…but I can't say that out loud. "Is there an estimate on how long they'll reach us?"

"Pah. Are you frightened?" Nameless Noble C smirked.

Eyeroll. "Somewhat."

Basilio smirks. "Being the first and only line of defense we have against Valm must be tough, Sir Ash."

"We'll manage it somehow." I laugh.

Flavia glares at the two of us.

"Sorry." We both mumble.

"There're no estimates on Valm's invasion plan, but based on our spies they should move around springtime." Flavia says.

Springtime…seven months. I don't think they're going to keep their ships anchored for seven months.

"I see you share our misgivings." Robin nods approvingly when she sees the doubt on my face. "Seven months is an incredibly long amount of time to anchor a fleet, so it's probable that the spies, or at least their sources of information, were compromised."

"It certainly wouldn't come as a surprise to me if Valm set sail as early as next week." Virion says with a very odd mixture of pride and seriousness. "Their ships are quite well prepared."

…

So there's a period of between 1 to 30 weeks were we might be invaded. That's…quite possibly the worst estimate I think I've ever heard.

_If the rain doesn't end soon, it may last a while._

…

"I guess we'll cross the bridge when we come to it." I sigh. "So what's the plan for dealing with the Risen army?"

Uncomfortable shifting from the nameless NPCs, exchanged glances from the named characters.

"That's the problem." Robin admits. "Most of the Feroxi nobles would prefer to leave the Risen army alone, while the rest of us would prefer to engage and destroy them piecemeal at the earliest available opportunity."

"If you can even do that." Nameless NPC 'Who the Hell Cares' snarks at her.

"And thus we were at an impasse." Virion nods. "What is your opinion, Ash? As another noble…and as a field commander."

Hmm…also, hi Virion. Where were you last year?

_He's got his feet on the table and doesn't seem to care._

We can take them, we being Ferox and Ylisse as a cohesive force. But the problem is we're going to lose troops doing so, and I'd rather not do that when Valm is on the horizon. Moreover, I don't know what the enemy army composition is.

_Plus, there's no way to set up any kind of killzone since the Risen don't attack while following human logic._

…Well, I imagine I could set up some kill zones given proper terrain.

"I'm in favor of beating the army down now." I finally say. "Leaving them alone runs the risk of the army getting bigger through nightly reinforcements."

"Indeed." Chrom nods. "But we do not have the means to fight an army of one million and escape unscathed."

"And if we lose too many men then Valm will pounce…hence, our reluctance." Nameless NPC 'Token Good Guy' says. "If you have an alternative means of engaging them we all would love to hear it."

Hmm.

I'm not gonna commit my girls to this if nobody else will commit troops.

"Do we even have an army ready for them?" I ask.

"Ylisse can spare around 2000 men. We're stretched thin with the defense of the kingdom as it is." Robin says apologetically.

"I can send about 4000, 6000 if we want to run the risk of getting a few towns sacked by Risen or bandits." Flavia says.

"I got 5000 here." Basilio raises his hand. "Less if we're playing it safe, obviously."

…

The rest of the nobles clock in and if we play it safe we have an army of about 20000 units.

"Obviously this isn't counting any militia we might rally." Nameless Noble 'Person' says. "Though I imagine pure numbers are of no help against the Risen."

Yeah, against a sizeable enough army a poorly rallied militia would just break and run, and I imagine that an army of a million Risen would qualify as "sizeable" for a lot of people.

_How many units can we field?_

If we were to enlist the town guards without endangering the town: 60 air, 200 land. Not a lot at all…but we have the quality of technology on our side.

More hmm.

…

…

…

_The debate continues for the remainder of the day and goes nowhere._

The fact that the Risen Armageddon Army isn't doing anything is what scares us, since if we make a dumb move and set them on the warpath it'll hurt a hell of a lot more than just sitting here and talking about it. All of us are afraid of being the person (being _blamed_ as the person) who woke the sleeping dragon, and thus nothing major is happening.

Which is why we retired for the first day with no real rewards. Basilio didn't call me all the way out here just to talk politics, did he?

_We retired to a side not-quite-room (there were no doors, just couches) in the Long Fort where we were served drinks by a local maid._

I was enjoying the tea when…

"Hey." Robin pats me on the shoulder. "Long time no see. I didn't expect you to become so famous within just six months."

"I share your disbelief." I raise my cup in greeting. "How's Ylisstol nowadays?"

_Our Town has received a lot of refugees lately because of the increased frequency of Risen attacks…the story of us sinking six ships with no effort is somehow translating to "That town is the safest place to be". Not that they're wrong, mind._

The huge influx of refugees is hurting the town's stability. A lot of issues are cropping up and…well it's a bit of a mess, really. If my reputation with the average folk wasn't as good as it is I imagine the situation would be a lot worse, so there's that.

_More precisely: Nino helps with the civilians, Severa helps out by beating the bejesus out of any troublemakers, Morgan's just incredibly happy and easy to get along with._

"Everyone's fawning over little princess Lucina." Robin squees. "She's so cute!"

_Severa, who crossed behind Robin just as the tactician squees, rolls her eyes._

"Who's your girlfriend?" Robin reaches behind her and nabs Severa by the sleeve, causing her to freeze in surprise and a little bit of fear. "I think you have forty now." She glances at Severa while strong-arming the girl into a chair. "She looks familiar."

"I was at the Winter Festival last year." Severa says diplomatically…and very obviously want to be anywhere but here. "It's a pleasure to meet you, Miss Robin."

Robin stares at Severa.

"…What?" Severa visibly shies away from Robin (deeper into her seat).

"You really do look like Cordelia." Robin concludes, giving both of us heart attacks.

"Uh…thanks." Severa has the deer-in-the-headlights look. She gives us a look like _How does she know?!_

"I wonder if you know that one kid?" Robin sips her tea.

Who's she talking about? "One kid?" I ask.

"Yeah." Robin has a thoughtful look. "Nowi met with some girl in a pretty white dress with a red cloak a while back. She seemed to know a lot and I thought the two of them were very similar to each other."

Sounds like Nah. "And because of that you thought Luna's related to Cordelia?" I ask Robin (faking as much incredulity as we can).

She stares at us for a minute. "So they're actually related?"

…

We can't lie worth shit.

_More like Robin is just very perceptive._

"Looks like there's more than meets the eye, huh?" Robin mutters when Severa tries to deny her but couldn't. "Eh…I'll keep my mouth shut, don't worry."

"Master." Ninya comes up and curtseys to us. "Lady…oh."

"Yeah, I found him first." Robin waves. "Thanks for looking, Nina."

We pull a chair for Nina and she sits next to us (somewhat stiffly, since she is technically a maid and social norms and blah blah blah).

"What did you think of today's meeting?" I ask her.

"A lot of words and very little content." Ninya replies politely. "I'm very glad we're spared from the intricacies of politics in our everyday lives."

Robin laughs. "Well said…though I suppose it's a little more practical this time around." She sips her tea again. "There isn't anything you can do to take care of the Risen first?" She asks me.

I shake my head. "I wish. If I had a lot of time to set up around them and there was no risk of them moving around we could level the whole army in a day…but obviously…"

"That's not a possibility." Robin finishes for me. "Damn. I heard of what you'd done to those ships."

You and everybody else. "Yeah, yeah…if you could engage the Risen army, what would you do?"

"You know the hill I pointed out?" Robin asks.

_There was a marked hilly area not too far from where the enemy markers were._

"I would lure the Risen to the area and set it all ablaze." Robin says. "And then finish off the rest with arrows and lances."

For the record, we'd pick the area too, but for different reasons: the hills make valleys, and valleys make funnels, and funnels are good for bombing runs.

_We also recently finished an anti-land weapon that we're currently field testing._

If it wasn't so supply heavy we might actually consider fielding it in the Valm campaign.

…

_The rest of the night went by pretty nicely. A lot of old and friendly faces despite the loom threat…a nice fire…Ninya…_

Even though we call it a 'looming threat' it really is a hard image to grasp…a million Risen just milling about in a small area doing next to nothing.

"Severa."

"Yeah, Boss?" She replies with a snappy salute.

_We nabbed her before bedtime in the hallway._

"Can you do me a favor tomorrow?" I pull out a copy of our modified Snapshot tome.

_Modified since the pictures it takes are lower resolution so we can make more of the books faster._

"You want me to scout the Risen army?" She raises an eyebrow. "Alone?"

Well if you put it that way…"Yeah."

She tosses the tome around a little. "Got it…it'll be better than having Robin figure out who I am."

Huh. "Don't like her much?"

Severa makes a face. "I know she's important and special, but that doesn't mean I have to like hanging out around her. Better Cynthia than me, really."

…where is Cynthia, anyways?

Through Severa we've been able to...well, maybe not really 'pinpoint', but we've been able to get some information on the positions of the future kids lately.

The Lucina-Laurent-Yarne-Kjelle (plus One NPC) team is ricocheting around the Plegia/Ferox border, taking down bandits and Risen (mostly Risen) whenever they see it. Apparently they use Mustafa's town as a supply point every now and then.

_Wish they came up to see Severa (and us) every now and then too._

Inigo-Owain team is in Valm doing anti-Risen work. Occasionally they also team up with the Valmese military as mercenaries, so we're gonna have to be careful there to avoid friendly fire.

Nah-Brady-Gerome team is all over the place on the eastern side of the continent doing anti-Risen work as well. I don't know anything else since apparently Gerome writes the letters that Severa receives and his writing has the dual features of both 'intense terseness' and 'incredibly shitty penmanship'. I don't know why he's writing it and not, say, Nah, since I'm assuming that she would have the most beautiful handwriting ever.

So who does that leave?

Cynthia, who we have not heard from (or about) at all. There have been no stories (from the islands, Valm, or the mainland) concerning a loud-mouthed hero girl, and that scares me.

"_She'll be fine. Cynthia won't die even under the worst circumstances." Severa had commented. "The girl's tougher than roaches."_

And…Noire. Her entire personality gimmick relies on having a trinket or a bow, and neither item can be regarded as theftproof, and thus we get progressively more worried about her with each day. We've talked to a lot of slave traders in the past year or so and so far there haven't been any leads, so things are not exactly looking up for us.

_Fingers crossed that she simply hasn't appeared yet._

"_Noire's…well, ok, she's hardly the most reliable person around." Severa had said much to our terror when we asked for her input. "But as long as the people she's around sees her archery before her breasts she'll stand to have a good chance with them."_

Obviously that didn't make us sleep any sounder at night.

…

Still, since I'm at the Longfort now (and the Longfort is closer to a lot of major Feroxi and Ylissean cities) I can probably do a more thorough investigation than just relying on hearsay.

That being said, I didn't bring any assets with me, just some of the named characters. Bah.

_Severa's about the only one with both the mobility to cover a lot of distance and the stealth to remain undetected by virtually everyone, too._

Time to throw more money around…

…

_We spend the next week in the Longfort. Sometime in the middle we sent Cherche back home since she's still needed to train the air force._

I want to be anywhere but here: so much back and forth talking and so little shit getting done.

_Ultimately the problem comes from the fact that nobody's willing to take the blame for getting ourselves killed by the Risen and invaded by Valm at the same time._

Well…that, and the fact that our numerical estimates are just estimates. It takes time to muster troops and to gather them at one place, plus we're still getting small Risen attacks every day.

We are, however, making progress: the nobles are slowly but steadily favoring "just kill the fucking Risen" as an accepted plan of action.

…

UUUUUGH THIS SHIT IS BORING

…

"And here I thought you'd be more used to negotiations than I am." Basilio laughs. "Looks like my instincts failed me this time."

_We're taking time away from the endless circular debate to rest outside the Long Fort. It's a nice day, though the wind is a little bit nippy._

"Usually negotiations end after the first day, because we like getting things done instead of talking about it." I sigh. "Dear god, this is taking forever."

"It's usually much slower than this." Basilio reassures me. "The fact that Chrom the Prince of Ylisse are here makes things much faster, I expect…nobody wants to look bad in front of Chrom, after all." He winks at me. "You they don't care about."

_We shake our head. _"I'll take your word for it."

"Boss…and Khan Basilio, good afternoon." Severa appears around the corner.

"Severa, right?" Basilio grins at her. "Is she your spy?" He asks me.

_Severa frowns._

"More of a scout than a spy." I nod. "What do you have for me?"

"Right." Severa pulls out some pictures. "The Risen army is comprised overwhelmingly of Revenants…I saw nothing but Revenants, actually."

_She shows us a picture of nothing but the hoods of the Revenants._

…I…I don't know if this picture is gray because the spellbook malfunctioned or if it's because of the subject matter. If I didn't know better I would've thought that she took a picture of the insides of a factory that produces pants.

"I don't know what's more impressive." Basilio murmurs. "What this picture is depicting or this picture itself…Ash." He looks at me. "I'm starting to think that any price you name would be fair to have you in our court."

_We smile sheepishly. _"You're exaggerating." I gesture to Severa for her to continue.

"As you can see here," She procures another picture. "This group of Risen is highly unusual."

…the second picture is fucking _creepy_. It's a picture of nothing but the Revenant hoods…except all of their glowing eyes are looking through the camera. Quite a few of them have their heads turned 180 degrees to stare at her.

_Welp, I guess we're not sleeping tonight._

"They noticed you?" I ask Severa.

"I don't know." Severa admits. "I think they did, but there was no reaction even after this picture was taken. No growling, no chasing, nothing."

_We re-examine the image of "Risen staring into your soul"._

Judging by the camera angle, she climbed on a tree? All the Risen appear to be looking upwards towards the camera.

"And lastly, this one." Severa pulls out another image…huh. "As you can see…there are some higher quality units in the Risen army."

The image depicts a few Generals and Warriors in the sea of Revenants, but…

"It looks like the Risen are waiting for something." Basilio notes. "Are they waiting for orders from the bigger ones?"

Um. "If they do then it's incredibly bad for us…smart Risen. The one thing we don't really need…" _We scratch our head._

Hang on a second.

_The Risen have always shown some level of knowledge, nevermind their ability to use tools or magic._

Yeah, I vaguely remember the Risen that we met way back when we first came to the Fire Emblem Universe displaying rudimentary tactics and field awareness.

Or maybe I'm imagining it? Either way.

"On the other hand, the fact that they're sitting around waiting for orders makes them even more dangerous to attack." Basilio says gruffly. "If we attack and cut off their command structure, who knows what the rest of them will do?"

"The Risen have none of the mental restrictions of a normal soldier." Severa agrees. "If they do as they please then the only thing we're in for is a tough running battle…plus, if these Risen are really capable of following orders, then it's likely that the current tactics for fighting Risen will not be enough against them."

Well, shit.

…

_We talk for a little bit more before the politician table reconvenes._

Fuck that. WE are skipping the damn thing.

_Basilio dragged Severa into the meeting room in our place while she stared daggers at us._

The reason why we skipped is—beyond "fuck politics in general", I mean—is because we threw money around for hints. Unfortunately, it was now paying off. I say 'unfortunate' because I put money into the seedier people around, and the fact that I've gotten a reply doesn't bode well for the girls I'm searching for.

Since I received a messenger pigeon before Basilio got a hold of me, we're skipping the political table in favor of barhopping.

_Disregard Armageddon, acquire alcohol._

There is no plan more perfect, ignoring the whole 'we don't drink' thing.

…

…

We dropped in at a bar in the Long Fort's castle town, per the bird's instructions, and made contact with one of the men we paid to do the snooping.

_They were paid, namely, to look for "a blue-haired girl with a knack of heroism and abnormal enthusiasm" and "a girl with oversized breasts and an unusually terrifying laugh". We got a lot of weird looks._

It's descriptive enough without giving away names, and we're using the names as the final necessary check.

…

In the end, we had about six leads, and only one of them felt reasonable.

The fact that we had one that felt reasonable is in itself one hell of a problem.

_The only lead pointed to an abandoned fort held by a slaver group northwest of here, very close to where Noire's paralogue map would be._

I…am not looking forward to this.

…

…

[Slaver Fortress, Boss: Erza]

…

…

Erza, the wolf, sat upon the (makeshift) throne with a bored expression on his face.

He sighs. "Business is slow, new goods are hard to come by, and worst of all none of the usual buyers are showin' up." He grumbles. "Man, it's really hard to do good business nowadays."

"Maybe it's because your business strategy is horrible." A girl with short blue hair dressed in rags huffed. "When was the last time you cleaned this place? It's so stuffy in and gross in here."

"You're still awfully mouthy." Ezra growled and kicked the cage the girl was housed in. "Learn to show a little humility every now and then. Maybe people will buy you at that point."

"A hero doesn't need to be humble." Cynthia huffed while rubbing her head (which had made contact with the rough cage).

"Might be why you got sold by your old buddies." Ezra smirked.

Cynthia didn't look fazed. "They weren't buddies. More like duddies. Fuddy duddies."

Ezra simply shook his head. Here was this incredibly proud girl who used to be a Pegasus Knight, reduced to nothing but a slave-to-be because she was considered too annoying by the bandits that took her in. _And even after a year she still doesn't learn…hell, she's gotten more brazen as the months went by._

It could be said, however, that Cynthia's irrational enthusiasm and loudmouth status is what kept her safe from the slavers to begin with…and stopped her from being sold, because let's be honest: unless you know who or what Cynthia is, being around her is really fucking hard and is conducive to ulcers.

_In other words, Cynthia is a like an enthusiastic tiger. Best viewed and appreciated from a safe distance, and probably a bad idea to approach without pants._

Another part of Cynthia's safety could be attributed to Erza's style as a slaver: he was a man who avoided harming his merchandise if at all possible, and would treat them relatively humanely so long as there was a good enough chance of getting a good price with them.

Regardless, right now Ezra was enjoying a time where nothing interesting was going on and his stock of people were not being depleted, and it was annoying to both him and his underlings…especially his underlings, as they were getting progressively more restless by the day.

_Maybe I should open a few cages and get the men to burn off some steam. _Ezra thought idly. _Starting with this girl here…but then again she's an Ylissean Royalty, and I can definitely get a lot of money and a hero status if I 'return' her to the castle untouched…bah._

"Beg pardon, boss." One of his soldiers grabs his attention.

"This better be important." Ezra growls.

"Well, uh…a Feroxi noble has just showed up on our doorstep, and he's looking for business." The soldier replies.

"Business, huh?" Ezra mutters. "Who's dumb enough to waltz into our front door like this?"

He usually received business via delegates and secret messages…nobody in places of power wanted to be _caught _buying slaves.

…

Ezra was a businessman at heart, and after some deliberation received the Unknown Noble into his ramshackle court.

"It's the Bossman." Cynthia mutters when she sees Ash step into her field of view. "He looks so young."

Ezra didn't hear her; he was more focused on this noble in front of him. Unlike the previous Feroxi nobles who visited him before, alarm bells were going off in his head, signaling the fact that though this noble was not dangerous as an individual, he was incredibly dangerous as a person.

"So…what brings you out here? This is a pretty far out place to do some shopping." Ezra says confidently.

"I felt like I needed to do some cherry picking." Ash says lightly. "I heard you had some interesting articles and I came to take a look."

_Judging by how comfortable he is, this isn't his first trip into a hellhole. _Erza notes. _I wonder how much he's got on him? _"Really now? Well then, go ahead and take your pick. I'll have some of my boys lead you through our inventory."

"You have my thanks." Ash bows slightly.

…

[1st Person Camera]

…

That girl next to his throne looks like Cynthia…the bars are a little too thick and the lighting is too poor to get a better look, but I should assume that it is Cynthia unless otherwise noted.

So how should I approach this?

The safest way to act would be to find both Cynthia and Noire, buy them, and then go home. Assuming if the business transaction goes through smoothly, but I don't think my suddenly acquisition of two slaves would be overlooked…

Alternatively, I can go the full hero route and clean the entire place out. There're maybe fifty, sixty soldiers in the fortress itself, plus around twenty perimeter guards. I packed my sword and my pocket spellbooks, so if it comes to a hide and seek fight I should come out on top just fine…

_A bit of an underestimate: we have our gauntlets which contain both the sound spells and the small, wind-based nail launchers, plus our wind shoes. Our sword is a special make, too._

One-handed chainsword, with its chains accelerated via electricity rather than rotation…but we also carry a conventional Steel Sword.

_While we're having this mental debate, we're being led through the cages arrayed in broken down corridors within this fortress. Within the cages are people both young and old (but mostly young), including some children, some obvious families, and quite a few would-be warriors._

Hmm.

_We examine one of the cages in detail. A small girl resides in the cage (she couldn't have been more than ten years old), and she shrinks away from us as we look over the paper attached to the cage door._

I have to admit…I don't like this guy, but his documentation is pretty good.

_The girl in question is of good health and belongs to an ex-minor noble of Ylisse. Their family escaped from their estate when it was assaulted by the Risen and was then surrounded and cut down by the Risen they tried to run away from (undead horse beats human legs). The girl was the only survivor to be picked up by a group of bandits. She was then sold to Ezra for a pittance since the bandits were in desperate need of money and supplies and thus were in no condition to look after a little girl, however evil they may be._

Most of the stories here are pretty similar. Either they're the remaining survivors of a bandit or Risen attack, or they were sold into Ezra's position as a means of paying off some debt, or they were prisoners of war (usually of Plegia) who were captured by Feroxi nobles and sold for some quick cash.

Hmm.

Honestly, it's not that different from most of the other slaver camps I've visited in the past few months, better documentation aside. A lot of stories, a lot of what-ifs, and a lot of potential muscle we could relieve from the slavers.

_This, incidentally, is one of the many reasons why the normal folks like us: we have no problems with getting our reputation dirty for the sake of getting slaves un-slaved and re-employed, and we've never made a purchase of slaves for our own immediate personal benefit._

Buying slaves tend to be a pretty unclean deal in terms of reputation anyways, but since we have official contacts with some slavers (they get the slaves, we buy them and use them) it's not as damaging as if we move behind people's backs.

Plus happy families always help boost reputation.

_There have been Slavers who tried to take advantage of the fact that we are willing to do business with Slavers to try and kidnap people to sell, but whenever that happens said slavers tend to die via the Halloween girls._

…I don't see Noire anywhere around here though. Granted, the normal tell of her green outfit and large breasts is a lot harder to find when all the girls are dressed in rags and sitting with their back to the visitor. It's not like I can just yell her name out either, since it attracts unnecessary attention and could yield false positives…

_We return to Ezra after touring all the cages once._

"Well, did you see anything you like?" Ezra asks.

"I seem to have missed a cage." I nod to Probably!Cynthia's cage.

"Ah, yes…I have to admit her status as a loudmouth keeps me company." Ezra laughs. "I've had her for a year and there haven't been any takers despite her fair complexion."

…Jeez, she's been cooped up for a year?!

_We approach the cage._

That…definitely looks like Cynthia. Jesus, she's a mess. She definitely recognizes us, too.

_She's getting a little bit teary._

"To be honest," keep calm, keep calm… "I saw your bookkeeping back there, Ezra. Really good work, I'm impressed."

"Why, thank you. I pride myself on my meticulousness." Ezra laughs. "A wolf eats when he can, but a smart wolf only takes food that's clean."

He's not even kidding, either. "I have half a mind to recruit you into my service, you know?" I'm not looking at him, because if I do I'll glare…sorry Cynthia, we're scaring you accidentally. "Someone with an eye for detail like you would be quite useful as a quartermaster."

"Heh…I'm glad that you think so." Ezra chuckles. "But you know, I'm a lone wolf, and I don't like listening to orders."

"Lone wolf, huh…?" _we turn to look at him, and he flinches in response_. "Lone wolves simply starve to death…wolves are pack hunters, after all."

Ezra snaps his fingers and I hear swords unsheathed behind me. "I've got my pack right here."

…

[3rd Person Camera]

…

Ezra's men watched in surprise as Ash's steel sword vanished from his grip and reappeared in Ezra's chest. They then flinched as his other sword roared with an unholy fury.

With one swift move Ash cut Ezra in half through the waist with the sword that roars.

"Next." Ash says coldly, retrieving his steel sword from Ezra's detached upper half with a flick of his wrist.

Ezra's most loyal soldiers came to their senses first, and charged towards Ash screaming bloody revenge.

_Four Swordmasters…this is going to be rough. _Ash thought. _Normally._

The first Swordmaster opened with an overhead swing, but the swing was cut short when a steel sword suddenly appeared in his chest.

"What incredible magic…" The second Swordmaster growled. "Attack without showing an opening!" He commanded as he lunged forward.

Ash punched him in the face with his free hand, and the man stumbled and fell to the ground in a daze.

The third and fourth Swordmasters stopped in their rage-induced charge.

"It seems like his reputation as an unorthodox fighter and mage is well deserved." Swordmaster C said.

"He has a lot of petty tricks up his sleeve." Swordmaster D sneered. "No match for us as a man, certainly."

"At the end of the day, those who survive are the victors." Ash says simply. "That's how it is."

"Indeed." Swordmaster C agreed. "And it's quite foolish of you to dive headlong into an enemy fortress alone, regardless of your reputation."

"Well, it was a thing worth doing." Ash raised his free hand and gripped the air.

Swordmaster D fell to his feet, shivering uncontrollably as pools of darkness gathered and washed over him.

"The hell…?" Swordmaster C jumped back instinctively. "To think that a noble of Ferox is so well versed in dark magic…you've fallen far as a country." He spat.

"Oy, oy…I'm the one doing the dabbling here." Ash laughed. "Don't lump the others together with me."

"What do you want?" Swordmaster C demanded as Swordmaster D stops twitching.

"Free all the slaves and get the fuck out. In return, you get to live." Ash said confidently. "Naturally, that extends to all of you." He raised his voice to address the other units behind the Swordmaster.

"I find it difficult to believe you will just let us go." Swordmaster C said disbelievingly. "Especially after you killed our boss and three of the most skilled soldiers so quickly."

_The advantage of surprise helped. _Ash thought. "I'm a man of my word."

"And we are men of pride." The Swordmaster snapped. "All units! Avenge our boss and kill this bastard!"

The rest of the men gave a mighty roar and charged forward.

"Sheesh." Ash pulled out a small but thick looking spellbook. "Well, at least it gives me an excuse to use this."

_Wait wait wait wait, is that what I think it is? _Cynthia thought frantically. _Boss! I'm still in here!_

Ash concentrated his magical power into the spellbook, and then released a blank of electrical charge that permeated the entire room.

_Oh, so it wasn't what I thought it was. _Cynthia breathed a sigh of relief. _So what is it? _She stared intently at Ash, who then wreathed himself in strands of dark magic…with a signature not unlike Nosferatu.

…

[1st Person Camera]

…

Ok, first stage setup, confirmed, effective…

Second stage setup…confirmed, active…ready.

Siege Spell status…set up complete.

_The first batch of Fighters have reached us and are raising their axes to attack._

…

[3rd Person Camera]

…

Ash snaps his fingers, and a bolt of dark energy ran through the Fighters with a thunderous boom.

The rest of the enemy units stopped in surprise as the bolt hit the wall furthest from Ash…and then promptly turned back to strike at the enemy units again.

The occupants of the room watched in shock as, within the timespan of about three seconds, the bolt of energy bounced three times in total (killing eight enemies) before it struck the floor and exploded.

"What the hell was that?!" Swordmaster C demanded, backing away further.

"Chain Lightning." Ash gathers two more arrow-like bolts of dark energy in his hands. "I can only make them bounce three times though." He threw them both at the enemies while they're still recovering from the previous bolt hits. "But I think they hit hard enough."

The secondary shots bounced around the room and killed seven more enemies, with one of the shots impacting Cynthia's cage and destroying it.

"Don't falter." Swordmaster C said to his men (who listened with varying levels of doubt). "He can't shoot those things all the time."

"Yeah." Ash agrees. "Which is why I can do this." He creates rows upon rows of the chain lightning bolts and they hover in the air around him.

"Oh fuck this shit." One of the nameless enemy soldiers say. "I'm out of here."

Upon him saying so, the bandits around him all voice their agreement and retreat out of the fortress.

Swordmaster C looks behind him in disbelief as the ex-slavers clear out in record time. He then looks in front of him at the very obviously deadly bolts of dark magic pointed at him and then makes a decision.

Namely, to turn and run.

Ash, in response, shot him in the back of the head and killed him.

"Uwah…no mercy at all." Cynthia breathed. "You're just like the old bossman…or is it that the bossman is just like you?"

Ash scowled. "I do what's necessary, that's about it."

"Yep. Just like bossman." Cynthia grins.

…

[1st Person Camera]

…

Jeez, she's really chipper for someone who's spent the bulk of a year in a cage. Also, those rags are not very good at keeping her covered.

"Can you walk?" I ask her.

Cynthia scratches her face and looks away embarrassedly. "Yeah, about that…I tried to run one time too many, and uh…" She laughs sheepishly. "They might have broken my legs. A while ago."

…

…

_We stare at her in disbelief._

That's not a line you're supposed to deliver while smiling! Jesus Christ! The fuck is wrong with you?!

"Sorry!" Cynthia says quickly. "It wasn't on purpose! Er…well, it was on purpose but not really, so…eh?"

_She quickly stops talking when we pull her into a hug._

"No apologies from you." I say firmly. "I should be the one apologizing for letting you get hurt this badly."

"Uhm…boss?" Cynthia says quietly. "You uh…"

_We can feel that she has no bra._

Trying to ignore that, thanks. "Since you can't move, I need you to wait here while I open the rest of the cages…alright?"

Cynthia beams. "Sure thing!"

…the fact that she's so unabashedly positive hurts. It really does.

_In any case, we go around and unlock all the cages and tell the freed slaves to gather near the fortress exit._

Afterwards, we picked up Cynthia and gave her a ride on Magna while going around with some of the more physically fit ex-slaves (a surprising number of them) to raid the place for supplies. Since the slavers cleared out in a fucking hurry they left almost all of it behind.

Ezra, as it turns out, wasn't much of a hoarder of gold and wealth…most of the stuff we found were food, medicine, weapons, and so on. Might be because he was running out of money, though.

Unfortunately, nothing for Cynthia's legs but I'm pretty sure we can patch them up just fine with a Restore staff…do we have to set the bones before restoring? I'm worried that if we just pour magic into the broken parts (and I don't even know what's broken right now) she's just going to end up with permanently damaged legs.

_Might be a good idea to ask the healers some questions later._

Our company employs full-time healers now. I never mentioned that, did I?

_No._

In any case, after we got our shit sorted out (read: gave weapons to the ex-warriors to organize an ad-hoc guard party) we escorted the rest of the ex-slaves out of the fortress to the nearest town.

Ultimately, the problem remains that they are ex-slaves, and even when recovered…well, they have nowhere to go and nothing in their favor. The fighters can probably find jobs within a local militia (god knows they're stretched for manpower nowadays) but the women and children…it's gonna be bad for them.

Also, what the hell was Ezra thinking, trying to sell families? Every slave trader I've had the misfortune of needing to do business with shied away from them.

_Pretty sure it's too late to ask him now._

Yeah.

"What was with that magic you did back there?" Cynthia had asked during the trip. "It felt way different from the magic the…older? Bossman was used to using."

Really? "Really?"

"Yeah, it felt really…um…" Cynthia mulls it over. "Evil!"

…

"Not in a bad way!" Cynthia quickly backpedals when Magna growls his disapproval. "It's good evil! Heroic evil! Uh…I'm not really making my case, am I…?"

_We pat her reassuringly on her head._

"It's a weird feeling." Cynthia continues when it's clear that we're not really mad at her…it's really hard to be. "I know you're using dark magic, but for some reason it feels so much friendlier than all the times when I saw you use other kinds of magic."

Really now? "You're used to seeing me cast that often?"

"Yep!" Cynthia nods happily. "You were always in the air, and I really looked up to you! I mean, you were really scary whenever you flew and it never felt like you had any friends, but…uh."

_We pat her on her head again._

"Anyways, until you died you were the bestest Wyvern rider in both continents…at least I think so. Gerome would disagree, but he's a meanie so he doesn't count." Cynthia concluded confidently.

_Her statements should probably be taken with some amount of salt. Like, enough salt to change the taste of the Pacific Ocean._

Also I don't think she was old enough for military service when Future!Me was still alive…Lucina was probably the only one who could have served in active combat at that point.

_How old is Cynthia compared to Lucina?_

Well…by default their age don't feel too far apart, so let's assume that before they travelled back through time there's roughly a two-year difference. Lucina travelled back two years ago, and Cynthia apparently made it last year or so, so they have roughly three years between them.

_Game-wise, sure. In our case the difference might be greater, since the Shepherds were taken out of commission much, much earlier. The shit also hit the fan much later for us since we were around to take over for governance as opposed to Ylisse and Ferox losing their heads of state in one go._

_Furthermore, Lucina had an initially negative reaction to us, while everyone else we've met had a largely positive reaction instead._

Lucina was probably in active service before we died. Severa did remember our funeral, and Cynthia is implied to be roughly her age (we're assuming that just because they are vitriolic best buds they have a similar age). What would future me do?

_Future you would rope Lucina into military service at a relatively young age and use her to rally support with the Ylisstol populace. 12 sounds like an acceptable age to start._

So…she starts serving at 12, we die when Severa's old enough to know what's going on (so, let's say, 10), and then bad things happen and they travel back through time?

_Judging by the feel of things Lucina had served for a while, so we can assume her to be around 14 or 15 by the time we died._

Lucina doesn't look that old now, so she's...uh,

_If things held together for a few years after we died, which appears to be the case, Lucina should be in her early 20s while the rest of the Future kids are almost 18 or so. It might be faster to just ask. Also, Cynthia has been tapping our wrist for the past minute._

I can see why anyone would misconstrue the Lucina/Chrom meeting at the end of chapter 13. Also, "What's up?"

"Can I sleep?" Cynthia asks.

We frown. "Uh…sure? I gotcha." We adjust our posture to secure Cynthia better.

…

Cynthia slept for pretty much the entire trip as we got to the nearest town…incidentally, the trip took the entire day.

_What was left of the entire day, anyways: it was roughly noon when we left the Long Fort via flight and very dark when we arrived at the town on foot._

Uh…I don't feel like dealing with Rested!Cynthia for the night, so let's not wake her up.

_Judging by how deeply she's sleeping despite the horrible conditions, waking her up might actually be impressively difficult._

Uh…I rented a few inns for the ex-slaves, and they all at least had bedding for the night. We of course also rented a nice room for Cynthia and had the dubious task of tucking her in.

_Without her rags, since sleeping in them would be uncomfortably unhygienic._

Yeah, yeah, we stripped her…though I have to say, the amount of healed and unhealed cuts on her body was just obscene. I don't think I ever thought about the repercussions of her throwing herself headfirst into the enemy lines as a hero. Note to self: Get Cynthia to a healer skilled in removing scars so she can kick ass while looking her prettiest.

_Non-sequitur: her mark is located underneath her left breast._

…yeah, y'know what? I might as well own up to the fact that we did, in fact, spend a few seconds looking for it.

_Note that it only took us a few seconds to find it._

…

Either way though. Basilio's gonna be _pissed_ when I get back to the Long Fort tomorrow.

Severa's going to be angry too.

_Doubly so since we favored Cynthia over her._

Ooh dear. Not looking forward to that little meeting…then again the two are buddies (kinda), so it might work out just fine.

_At the end of the day though…_

Yeah…Noire wasn't among the group. According to Ezra's books someone matching her physical description was sold off already, but water damage made it impossible to make out exactly who she was sold *to*.

In other words, we're right back at square one when it comes to Noire. Dammit.

…

Well, maybe not. Noire as a character is reasonably unique in of itself, and no sane person would look at her and go "yeah, she'll make a great archer" with zero context.

In that event, I can probably leverage my reputation and ask around some.

_Where?_

I've scanned through Ezra's books during the trip, and it seems like he refuses to do business deals that are disadvantageous to him economically, so he avoids selling slaves to high turnover sites likes mines…or brothels of ill repute, for that matter. Not enough profit for how much work he has to do.

That being said, it wasn't as if he never sold to those spots entirely (he sold them a few manager-types), so we can't completely rule those sites out.

_I wonder which brothel would buy a girl whose claim to fame is the ability to go batshit insane at the drop of a hat?_

The one that caters to a fringe audience? I dunno. There are people who like Noire for her insanity, let's not forget about that.

_I imagine that the groups who like her as a character and the groups who like her as a product are mutually exclusive to each other._

…Yeah, probably.

…

…

[Elsewhere, Long Fort]

…

…

"So master never came back, I see." Nina sighs. "I wonder what took him?"

"Worried?" Severa sips tea. She'd taken a liking to the tea served by the Long Fort.

The two of them were sitting in what would be Ash's room.

"Hardly. I have faith in him and his unorthodoxy." Nina says evenly. "Out of all of us here, I know him the best."

"Sure, if you believe that." Severa rolls her eyes…though she admits (inwardly) that this version of Ash doesn't match what she knows all that well.

Nina stares at her for a little bit. "What?" Severa demands after a short minute.

"You're a future child, like Morgan, no?"

Severa nearly chokes and coughs. "What gave you that idea?"

_Apart from how you almost just died? _Nina thought with a blank expression. "Master told me."

"Ain't that wonderful." Severa puts down her cup. "Yeah? What of it?"

"He seems to take your safety…and the safety of Morgan, seriously." Nina says.

Though Nina's tone never changed Severa felt like she needed to hit something…and then she stopped to think it over. "So you think he found someone else?"

"I believe it to be a possibility." Nina nods.

"Um…hmm." Severa mulls it over. "So it's either Noire or her…but all things considered, she should be fine…and far from here."

"She?" Nina tilts her head quizzically.

"Nevermind." Severa sighed and then glanced out the window. "Why did the Boss tell you about us?"

"It was easier to work with Morgan if I knew where he came from…not that he himself cares, it seems." Nina replies. "It was simply extrapolation when it came to your origins."

"Is it that obvious?" Severa groans.

Nina was spared from needing to reply when someone knocked on the room's door very loudly…so loudly that Severa thought they were being attacked and jumped to her feet with her sword in her hands.

"Come in." Nina calls out much more calmly.

Basilio practically rips the door off of its hinges. "Ash still ain't back yet?" He growls.

"No sir." Nina shakes her head. "Is something the matter?"

"Yeah. The Risen army just moved. They rampaged through the nearest village and tore it to ribbons this afternoon." Basilio spat.

"Shit." Severa sheathed her sword. "Are we moving out?"

"You got it." Basilio nods. "Flavia's announced for an emergency muster, and right now the big Risen Army is everyone's trouble." He looks at Nina. "You're Ash's maid, right? Do you know where he is?"

Nina shook her head. "Unfortunately, he left without telling me."

"Great, just great." Basilio scratched his head. "Well, when he comes back, tell him to rally his troops. It'll take us more than a week to meet that army in the field anyways."

"In that case," Nina stands up. "Master Ash has given me the power to call the troops to arms in his stead. I believe I shall do so."

"Really?" Severa frowns at her. "He trusts you that much?" _He never trusted anybody as far as I remember. _She thought.

"It's surprising to me too." Nina smiles. "That he would place such faith in a maid."

"Yeah, yeah." Basilio agrees distractedly. "Get it done, we need every man we can get."

…

…

[Ash, next day]

…

…

Cynthia didn't wake up.

…

…

Yeah, my heart almost stopped too. We did do some panicked checking of life signs and she is, fortunately, still alive. Regardless we hired a local healer to watch over her just in case if things actually went south.

_According to the healer she's simply resting after "being safe". The guy wasn't terribly good at making his point clear, but very loosely she's in the phase of resting after being in survival mode for so long._

In other words, Cynthia's currently in the oddly dangerous state of someone who has just come out of a life-threatening situation, and since she's relaxed, her body is recuperating from the excess stress it took while she was imprisoned. If memory serves (and I'm pretty sure there's a technical term for this) this state of relaxing after a dangerous situation can cause people to die, so, again, fingers crossed.

Anyways, since Cynthia was in no condition to travel we spent the entirety of the day handling the issue with the ex-slaves. As expected, the military ex-slaves were folded into the local militia, the family ex-slaves were…somehow, employed.

_The local job market wasn't conducive to widows._

No, no it really wasn't. Then again the town itself wasn't all that big…which I imagine is why a majority of the ex-slaves decided to travel with a caravan to a larger town nearby to try their luck. We gave them pocket money and hoped them the best.

_That took us most of the morning._

For lunch, we stayed near the Inn of Cynthia. Our actions of trying to help a group of slaves (plus our innate fame) earned us a free lunch, so that was good.

_We also got hit on, that was also good._

We also got hit by some drunken dude. That was not as good. The drunk dude hit on the lady hitting on us (while she was hitting on us), which was interesting to watch, but was ultimately not too good.

_Nobody was really sure why he was drunk in the middle of the day or what he was drunk *on*, but we got to fulfill one of our bucket list desires of mauling someone with a barstool, so that was great._

We also ended up meeting Nah! Which is definitely good.

"Boss!" Nah had said in shock before hurriedly curtseying. "What…what are you doing out here?"

"Cynthia." I said simply. "I found her and she's resting here."

"Wasn't she supposed to be on the islands?" Nah asked.

_We sigh. _"Well…she wasn't."

After one exposition later, we (me, Nah, Brady) secluded ourselves in Cynthia's room.

_We paid off the hired healer for the full day despite him not really doing anything. He wasn't about to talk._

Also, Gerome is somewhere outside the town. He didn't want to enter because his disguise was too conspicuous.

_We grinned and couldn't stop upon hearing that._

"Yep, she ain't waking up for a few days, boss." Brady said after giving Cynthia a once over. "Who messed up her legs? You got a name?"

"I got him already, Brady. He's dead." I shake my head.

"Good." Brady sits down in a chair. "Little shit deserved every last bit of it."

"Can…can she still fly like this?" Nah asks worriedly.

Brady shakes his head. "Not for a while. Like Gerome always say, being mounted means having some good leg strength, and it doesn't look like she's used her legs for a long while…it'll take a bit before she'll be fit enough to walk, let alone ride, I imagine."

"Years and years of fighting Risen and ultimately it was a human who hurt her." Nah murmurs. "How horrid."

"You're forgetting the duke." Brady says gruffly.

Which duke?

"A noble from our time. Don't worry about it." Brady hurriedly says when he sees my confusion. "Nah, can you go pick up some clothes for Cynthia? She'll need it when she wakes up."

"Sure. Uh…" Nah glances at me.

"Need money?" I pull out a pouch of gold and toss it to her. "Go nuts."

Nah peers into the pouch and…kind of stares at it blankly for a bit.

_We may or may not have caught a flash of jealousy._

"Buy something for yourself too." I add.

Nah looks up at me sharply and turns slightly red before hurrying out of the room.

_I think she knew we noticed. Also, she tripped on the open door._

She's still Nowi's kid despite her maturity, how cute.

"How much money did you give her?" Brady asks cautiously.

Uh. "10k, I think." _Brady looks confused. _"Ten thousand."

"Damn."

…Huh.

"Do you guys not get pocket money?" I imagine that future me would play favorites with money.

"From who? Future Boss?" Brady raises an eyebrow. We nod in response. "Not a lot. The future boss was self-absorbed until we got older, and then he died before he could do anything substantial, and _then_ the shit hit the fan, so…" Brady shrugs. "Not a lot of opportunity for a day off."

Point taken.

"Still…listenin' to things go down on the coast, it almost feels like we have the old boss again." Brady chuckles.

_We freeze._

"I mean…I ain't like Lucy." Brady continues. "I like the future boss. Strong, tough, and doesn't take shit from nobody." He then thinks for a second. "Then again, Lucy was actually a captain, while I just sat in the healer corps when we needed the bodies."

He sounds slightly bitter.

"Dude, healers are important." I point out.

"I know, I know." Brady grumbles. "It's just demoralizing to heal the wounded and know that I could have stopped it to begin with. An ounce of prevention and all that."

Future me quote a lot of things, apparently.

"Well…you're there to help us when we fail to stop it to begin with." I gesture to Cynthia. "So thank you for that."

Brady chuckles sadly (the kind that's just a sad exhale through the nose). "Yeah."

…

…

We sat in silence and waited for around 30 minutes until Nah came back in a hell of a hurry (with a dress in hand and a box of cookies). We think she has cookies because she's got one in her mouth.

_She tosses the cookie in her mouth into the air._

"BOSS!" Nah shouts as she tosses the dress onto Cynthia's bed. "Noire!"

_She re-catches the cookie with her mouth._

She's out there? "Let's go." We shoot up to our feet.

_Nah gently puts down the box of cookies, gives a deathglare to Brady (who does an "I'm not touching your box" surrender) and rushes out of the room._

I think our brain has just caught up to Nah's trick with the cookie. "Did she always do that?" we ask Brady.

"Nah gets first dibs on all sweets we get." He shrugs. "It's the law of the land."

Yikes.

_We rush out after Nah._

…

"NOIRE!" Nah has a very clear yelling voice.

_She let loose the instant she came out in the open._

Unfortunately everyone turned to look, so I'm not sure if…judging by how quickly Nah is navigating the street of people I think she got her mark.

_Why is Noire here?_

We might as well ask her when we get her.

Also, wow Nah is fast.

_We follow the little red blur along the street until she suddenly jumps and tackles a tall girl with short hair to the ground._

"Gotcha." Nah says happily. "Hey Noire." She hops off of the girl.

"U-uhm…" Noire has an unsure smile on her face. "Nah? Is that really you?"

"Uh-huh." Nah nods. "What are you doing here?"

"I…I'm out shopping." Noire indicates to the bag on the ground. "Uh…" She sees me. "H-hello, boss."

We nod…because it was kind of hard keeping up with Nah even while moving at a full sprint, so we're not really in a talking position.

"Noire, what…" A nobleman (with his wife on his arm? I think?) says as they come up from behind us. "Are these friends of yours?" The man asks politely.

"Uh…yes, m-master." Noire nods and stands up (and dusts herself off).

_Noire is dressed like a maid, but with a custom modification to draw attention to her breasts._

As a non-sequitor: Nina wears a maid outfit with a shortened skirt to make running easier.

I finally have the breath to talk cohesively. "So you're her master, I see."

"Yes, and you are…?" He says cautiously.

_Judging by the glances the lady is giving Noire, the two don't exactly get along._

Stand up straight, good posture…"I'm Ash, pleased to make your acquaintance."

He blinks in surprise. "The Lord of the Coast…it's a pleasure indeed. I was unaware you were friends with our Noire."

'Our Noire', he says.

_Nah tensed up to kick ass when she heard that._

She can probably kill the entire damn town by herself, too. "Well, as circumstances would have it. Do you mind if we have a little chat?" I adjust my stance a little to show off my sword (the normal steel one). "In private, if you don't mind."

…

_The couple takes us back to their house…which is a fairly upscale house in the town, but obviously not a mansion similar to ours. That said, compared to most of the houses in town they are obviously wealthy, if not the wealthiest family around._

…

…

[Exposition]

…

…

Well…in a nutshell, the family (the man) saw Noire (her breasts) and bought her out of pity (because of her breasts). Noire has been serving the family as a maid (eye-candy) ever since.

I really, _REALLY _wish there was some deep underlying motive.

But no.

He was just a sucker for breasts.

The lady that was with him (his wife) didn't look too kindly on Noire. Fortunately she could put two and two together and didn't place the blame on Noire too much. Her marriage with the man has been strained ever since though.

_Also probably due to her whipping his ass and keeping it in line: Noire's status is merely eye-candy instead of, say, mistress…or mother._

Major props to the lady.

In any case, after we figured that part out we entered into negotiations for Noire's freedom.

This was pretty easy, all things considered: the man ultimately did still love his wife dearly and was willing to part with Noire for a pretty cheap fee.

_Judging by Noire's expression, we paid more for her than the family did._

Meh. Either way, we got Noire and we didn't need to fight for her yay~

…

…

Noire's recovery was met (by Brady) with mild enthusiasm.

Largely because he had given in to temptation and took one of Nah's sweets.

Protip: never take Nah's sweets.

_A reasonable end effect of Nah's food-focused supports with the MU in the game, I suppose._

She looks so happy when she's munching on the foodstuffs, though. Even if she almost shoved Brady's healstick up his ass.

…

So…I guess we're waiting until Cynthia wakes up?

_Ooor we can go home to the Long Fort and not have Severa hate us more._

…Or we could do that. Actually it's probably in our best interest to do that. It's probably very much so in our best interest to do that.

…

_We leave Cynthia to the care of the other future children and return to the Long Fort._

Where we find out that the Risen army had begun to move and there was an emergency muster to intercept and destroy. We also found out that Nina was en route back home to get Cherche and the rest of the girls (Flavia gave her a Pegasus Knight to make the travel faster)…

But it's still going to take about two weeks for her to make it with reinforcements, nevermind the logistical issues of having enough bombs for them to drop onto the Risen.

_So what do we do?_

We…

We hurry to assist the anti-Risen efforts. Two weeks is an impressively long time for a non-siege battle. But just in case, we (while abusing Basilio's authority) send messengers to all surroundings towns and warn them of a possible Risen threat and the Risen army.

So basically we're going to wait for a day in order to gather as many mercenaries and levy troops as we can before marching onward to the Risen forces. Judging by the map and the projected movement lines (that Robin drew, probably) we'll be able to intercept them southwest of the Long Fort, near where the Arena map marker is…

…Isn't that place inside of a town?

Was it inside of a town?

_Does it matter?_

No, I guess not.

…

[Combat Area, Risen Army Intercept Operation]

…

Upon hearing of the Risen Army's movement, Chrom and an army of roughly 2000 cavalry (plus the other named characters present) deployed to intercept the Risen army in order to give the villages in their projected path of movement time to escape.

With the speed of the cavalry (driven by utter panic) the advance forces led by Chrom and about a hundred Paladins engaged the Risen during the afternoon.

"Chrom, we don't have all the time in the world here." Robin yells to him. "Don't get bogged down with the small fry and watch for my signals!"

The two of them were riding at the head of the cavalry wedge, with Chrom leading the formation.

"Got it!" Chrom replies. "We're breaking in!"

Robin scans the Risen mob in front of her. "Where am I even meant to begin with this…?" She mutters. "Alright. Chrom, two steps left!"

Chrom leads the wedge slightly left, offsetting their previous target by about twenty bodies. The wedge also picked up speed into a full charge.

"Nevermind them!" Robin yells when the Risen's heads turn as one to look at the incomers. "Just break through them!"

"Right!" Chrom raises his Falchion high in the air. "On me!"

The wedge of cavalry crash into the Risen lines and dive deep into the sea of vapor zombie flesh.

_Revenants are not known for their short-term durability. They are, however, well known for having sharp as hell claws._

Those sharp claws reached for the Paladins as the horsemen went through the Risen horde, causing the interesting effect of said claws lodging into the horses…while detaching entirely from the Risen body themselves. A few Paladins were dragged down to the ground by the claws of the Risen upon their mounts and were mauled and killed on the spot.

Unfortunately, the momentum of the charge meant that Chrom and the rest of the Paladins were unable to turn back and assist even if Robin wasn't commanding them to do otherwise.

But she was: the entire point of the operation was to strike surgically into the Risen swarm and kill their obviously special promoted units (or at least to take them out of action).

"We talked about the risk of the lesser Risen becoming disorganized and striking civilians at random, Robin." Basilio had warned her when she told them her plan.

"Compared to the threat of an organized Risen army moving according to some unknown strategy, losing one or two villages is a small price." Was Robin's retort…though her body language plainly showed that she wasn't too happy with the plan either.

But there wasn't time to complain, since the Risen army was in fact moving and was killing the hell out of people. Thus, Basilio and Flavia (and their captains) were running around the far edges of the Risen army, picking off any of them that broke off from the main force for any reason in order to try and keep the villages as protected as possible.

_It was not a resounding success._

Regardless, Chrom saw a Risen Sniper to his front and slightly to the right. With a gleam of his Falchion he reoriented the Paladins behind him to charge directly at the Sniper. The Sniper itself retaliated by sending an arrow straight through a Paladin's skull, dropping him and his horse onto the ground even as Chrom ran through the Sniper with extreme prejudice.

"Dammit." Robin fired a barrage of Fires into the Risen swarm. "Chrom!"

Chrom took the rest of the Paladins out of the swarm while Robin cleared a path in front of them with enormous gusts of wind.

As the last of the Paladins were clear of the Risen claws, Robin looked back and saw…no reaction. Though the Risen were looking at her, they were continuing on their march towards god knows where.

…

Their anti-Risen tactics would continue for the remainder of the day, until it was too dark to continue.

Robin expressed what she thought of the day by punching a nearby tree as they made camp.

"I know what you mean." Chrom sighed. "I did not think that such weak Risen would prove to be such a major problem."

Individually the Risen were laughably weak.

"I want to know exactly where they're going." Robin complains to the stars. "If I know that then I'd know where to set up an intercept point."

The Risen were mindlessly moving to a target…but they'd constantly and suddenly (and as one unified body) change their direction every so often, making them unpredictable.

"And even better! We have Valm waiting on the sidelines!" She continued. "Gods! Why are you doing this to us?!" She shook her fist at the stars.

"Are you done?" Chrom asks with a bemused expression.

"Yeah, I'm done." Robin sighs. "A third of our cavalry lost in one day. This is tougher than I thought."

"I believe this is the first time I've ever seen any army pack up that tightly." Virion joins in on the conversation as the three pick their spots by the nearest campfire. "Today was a day where I could shoot blindfolded and hit something with maximum ferocity."

"Normal armies are a lot more spread out to avoid magical damage." Robin murmurs. "But for some reason these guys take much less damage from magic than I expected."

"Must be because of how tightly packed they are." Chrom growls. "Can we get some poleaxes?"

"The only ones who makes and sells poleaxes by the bulk is the Coast…and Plegia." Robin buries her head in her hands. "This is the worst."

Virion tries to console her. "I'm sure it's—"

Robin cuts him off. "Chrom, why did we spend a week talking about killing them instead of just killing them?"

Chrom didn't have a reasonable answer, and instead halfheartedly shrugged in reply…before nearly drawing his Falchion in alarm.

Severa, who had just walked up behind Robin, raised her hands in surrender. "Did I come in at a bad time?" She asks.

Robin froze. _I didn't hear her coming at all. _She thought.

"No, sorry. Your woodwork was just impeccable." Chrom relaxes and sheathes Falchion. "What news do you bring?"

Severa was acting as the runner between Flavia and the other forces.

She nods. "Right; Flavia's forces have engaged with multiple Risen groups during the day. They've taken about a hundred men in losses, and they've been able to protect three villages."

Chrom exhales slowly. "Sheesh. A hundred?"

"They're stretched thin with trying to keep up with the few hundred of the squishy Risen every time we hit the main force." Robin says, irritated. "Small wonder they're taking losses."

"Yes, sir." Severa coughs. "Basilio's forces have done the same as Flavia, and their losses number around 150."

"If our best leaders could only do so much I'm not looking forward to how many the others lost." Robin grumbles.

…

"So at the end of the first day, we've lost around a thousand men." Robin muses. "How many did we muster?"

"Six thousand, at best…not counting our advance force so far." Virion laughs darkly. "Truly, an exercise in futility. Perhaps we should withdraw for the moment? Let the Risen march to their target and kill them there?"

"If we knew where they were going." Robin chuckles. "In any event, tell our troops to get some rest. We'll use skirmishing tactics tomorrow and try to whittle down their numbers as much as we can."

…

Day two was smoother than day one…the good guys took less losses and killed less Risen, but only because they didn't have a million Javelins to throw.

Robin observed that, with the losses of a few of their promoted elites, the Risen moved with comparably less finesse than they had before, with a group of a few hundred units breaking off every so often from the pack for no apparent reason.

"I guess this means the promoted units are indeed exerting some level of control over the rest." She had said while trying to forcibly plow a path with her Thorons. "They never had a command structure before. What makes these Risen different?"

…

[Day three, First Person Camera]

…

Hoo…boy. From the sky this place looks fucked.

I think I have a different appreciation for the phrase "moving carpet" now. It's like…well, from up here in the sky it's like if the ground just suddenly became bullet ants and all they want to do is murder. Like…nothing but bullet ants for as far as the eye can see.

Or spiders. Deadly spiders for as far as the eye can see.

_Or wasps, but they don't really fly, so non-flight wasps._

I guess the point I'm making is: fuck the insects.

_Focus?_

Let's see…around the edges of this grey blob of death on the ground are three groups of people. I'm going to assume they're the Basilio, Flavia, and Chrom groups but I can't see any specific coloring from up here.

_We're flying pretty high up._

Basilio invited us to a political meeting, but we know we're in a fire emblem game and thus enemies will always show up all the time, so we had Magna carry a pair of Fletchettes just in case…which is why we're flying pretty high up, because I want to lob these things right on top of the enemy core.

_We're not lobbing them yet because we're trying to make sure we're not going to accidentally murder the good guys. Why don't we just go down for a closer look?_

Magna's pretty tired, since we flew ahead of the mercenaries to do scouting. If we go down we're not coming back up.

Oh, one of the groups just shot a Thoron into the swarm. That's probably Robin. Ok, good.

Target located, proceeding with operation "Fuck the Risen".

_We have two bombs. It's going to last five seconds._

Fine. Operation "Fuck the Risen Very Quickly" then.

…

[3rd Person Camera]

…

"There's a Wyvern Knight up there." One of Chrom's Paladins noted as they circle around the outside of the Risen swarm and stab away with their lances. "It's got a really odd shape to it."

"That's probably Ash." Robin says after squinting for a few seconds. "He's about the only Wyvern Rider Ferox has around here."

The Feroxi air force was overtaxed with dealing with the other Risen threats that keep spawning across the map…the ground force, too, but the air force has a greater freedom of range, so they get more work.

"Looks like he dropped something." Another Paladin notes as two blips detached from the Wyvern. "Huh."

The blips exploded and vanished.

…

[1st Person Camera]

…

Detonation looks ok…the fragments are dropping now. The coverage range should be plenty against such a tightly packed army, even if we weren't high enough to cause the self-forging effect…

…

Wait. We're worried that the Risen are being controlled by their promoted units, right?

_The same promoted units that exist within that blob of undead flesh and are moments away from being hit by sharp, armor-penetrating(maybe) shrapnel. Yes._

And we're worried that if the Risen are killed the rest of them would resume their normal "burn and kill everything in sight" behavior?

_Right. That was the sticking point for the week-long political mess._

…Huh.

_I expected more panic._

Well…when the air force lets you have freedom, it can't really…y'know, un-free the guys on the ground…

…

_Might be a good idea to warn the ground forces while we're waiting and seeing._

…Yeah, let's do that. Let's do that right now.

…

[3rd Person camera]

…

"What the?" Robin squints as she sees three huge flares in the sky. "Must be important. We're backing out!"

"Are you sure?" Chrom asks as he and the Paladins retreat from the Risen. "We're doing pretty well so far."

Robin didn't feel like telling Chrom that so far what they've been doing constituted chip damage. "Ash just fired a caution sign large enough to act as a sun, I think he's worried." Robin looks around for high ground. "C'mon, I want to see what the big deal is."

"Right." The two of them ride onto the hill just as the fletchettes strike the bulk of the Risen forces.

As an aside, the Risen army is comprised almost entirely of the type of Risen that evaporate very quickly after death.

Thus, Chrom and Robin (and a few Paladins) were able to witness the interesting view of a giant tornado of purple smoke somewhere in the center of the Risen army.

"Whoa." One of the Paladins muttered. "What was that? Some kind of magic?"

"Looks like the elites weren't killed by it." Another Paladin commented, seeing the lone promoted Risens (two Heroes) standing alone in the small clearing. "Whatever it was it wasn't too good against armor."

"It might just have been a sub-optimal strike." Robin chips in. "Regardless, watch the enemy movements closely and be ready to respond if they go berserk."

"Understood."

…

[1st Person Camera]

…

Ooh, that looked really pretty from up here…even if we killed…what, a few hundred of them tops?

_So now what? We don't have any javelins._

We have the standard issue rail gun.

_With around 20 shots._

It's better than zero.

"C'mon Magna," I tug on his reins. "Let's go down there and raise some hell."

…

[3rd Person Camera, Elsewhere]

…

Nah was simultaneously very careful and very loose with her money. Well, with the money that Ash left her. She really liked her treats and today was her third day of out shopping.

Cynthia had woken up around mid-day (an hour ago) and was clamoring for food, and thus Nah went on her shopping trip. While on the trip, she heard the news about the million-strong Risen army, and when she had returned to the room she shared the news with the rest of the group, who had taken the past three days as a much needed rest.

_Even Gerome had to join in. It wasn't much fun camping out in the woods._

"So that's where he went." Brady said when Nah finished her exposition. "I don't think we've ever saw a force of a million in our days."

"Maybe not at once." Nah tosses a cookie into her mouth. "But I'm sure we all have more than a million kills throughout our campaigns."

"And most of it would be attributed to you and Laurent." Gerome says tonelessly. "Did you find out where they are?"

"Um…" Nah thinks while Noire pulls out a map. "I think they were around here." She taps a spot on the map marked with a small, black x.

There was an uncomfortable silence as they stared at the x.

"Think it's too early?" Brady finally asks, eyeing the x with obvious distaste.

"Might be." Gerome nods. "But given how the captain has changed from our knowledge, it might happen earlier, too."

"Shit." Brady growls.

"Gerome." Cynthia says.

"I know what you're thinking. No." Gerome snaps.

"I'm not asking. Do it." Cynthia replies coldly. "On my authority as the Ylissean Ace of Aces."

Gerome was unfazed. "That isn't even a real rank."

"Cynthie, you're not in any shape to fight." Brady gently says. "I know you're—"

Cynthia was not known for being easy to persuade. She puts her hand to her mouth and whistles loudly and clearly.

Gerome's Minerva butts her head into the room's window, and everyone could see Cynthia's Pegasus sitting idly on the roof.

"Ugh." Gerome sighs. "Fine, fine…better than having you sneak off in the middle of the night anyways."

"Her legs are shot." Brady points out as Noire wrestles the wallet from Nah (with supreme difficulty) so she can go pay for damages…and because they are leaving. "But that hasn't stopped her before." Brady corrects himself. "Cynthie, no stupid moves, alright?"

Cynthia just grins happily as her Pegasus obediently trots up to the window and stuffs itself into the room.

Cynthia lifts herself from the bed and plops down in the Pegasus's saddle and then, with smooth, practiced motions, ties herself down with rope.

"You know, I'm not happy seeing you do this. None of us are." Brady says as Cynthia tests how well she's braced in her saddle. "It's not like that anymore, so there's no reason for you to push this hard."

"There are Risen." Cynthia replies simply. "And they need to have their asses kicked."

"Well, that I agree with, but still." Brady sighs. "The Boss is already handling the situation, so why not just let him do it?"

"And miss out on all that heroism? Never." Cynthia's grin turns predatory. "Now c'mon, we haven't got all day."

"I'll go on ahead with Brady." Gerome says. "Cynthia will follow later with Noire…don't get lost."

"Whaaat?" Cynthia sticks her tongue out. "I never get lost."

Brady's eyebrow went up by a fraction. "Wanna bet?"

Cynthia pouts in response.

"Thought so." Brady sighs. "Alright, let's do this thing."

"Gerome," Nah says, having finished carefully packing away the sweets. "Where did you stash the Orchis?"

"I left it in the woods." Gerome tosses a small, silvery key to Nah. "I've tried to do maintenance following the captain's instructions, but I don't think I've gotten anywhere. At best, you'll have access to the Pod Dispenser…and maybe the Option rods."

"Hmm…" Nah tosses the key around in her hand. "But the armor claws still work, right?"

"Those things wouldn't break even if the world ended." Gerome smiles slightly. "I'm off…we need a day's head start to beat you to the battlefield."

"Sure." Nah curtseys as Minerva takes off into the skies. "You need two days to beat me there, though."

"Whoo, Nah talking trash?" Cynthia notes happily as the color of Nah's face matches her cloak. "Now I've heard everything." She makes a huge show of taking out a notebook to write down what she saw.

Nah knew Cynthia was playing around but it didn't make her heart pound any less. "Meanie."

"Hehehe~" Cynthia reaches into a side pocket and tosses a bow at Noire just as the shy girl enters the room. "We're heading off too. Hop on, my bloodthirsty brethren!"

Noire, interestingly enough, did not switch, and meekly climbed onto Cynthia's Pegasus.

Cynthia rolls her eyes in response and takes off into the skies.

The last thing Nah heard before the two disappeared was loud, malicious cackling.

"Well." Nah takes a short, deep breath. "I should be going too."

…

The innkeeper was happy that he was paid, but not happy that he needed to repair the wall damage caused by Minerva…and was also not happy at a room of patrons apparently leaving via the roof instead of on the ground like normal people.

…

Nah's trip to the woods of Gerome's ex-campsite was short and uneventful. When she had gone a small distance into the trees, she held the key in her hand and channeled the power from her Dragonstone into it.

The key glowed in her hand and turned like a compass, pointing deeper into the trees.

Following the key for a few minutes, she came upon some metallic looking equipment resting against a slightly larger tree.

"Wow, he even polished them." Nah mutters. "Thank you, Gerome, you're a dear."

She straps the gear onto her small frame.

"It's a little heavier than before." Nah notes, hopping a little to get used to the weight. "Oh well."

She channels her power through to large engine block on her back (from the front, they look like an X extending outwards) and jump into the air.

"Nobody's here to hear me." Nah says to herself with a smile that was unusually childish…and happy. "Dendrobium Nana! Onwards and forwards!"

With an explosive force the engines on her back propelled her forward, and any onlookers would've heard a very overjoyed "wheeeee!" and laughter soaring through the skies.

…

[Elsewhere still]

…

"Lucina! You're going too fast!" Laurent warns.

"We have to go faster!" Lucina snaps. "Or it will happen this time!"

"That's not guaranteed!" Kjelle retorts. "If you keep going like this you'll kill your horse! Slow down!"

Lucina was not listening.

"Goddammit, you crazy woman!" Yarne growls and pulls out his beast stone. "Listen to us when we're worried about you!"

Yarne transforms into his giant demon bunny mode and dashes next to Lucina's horse, forcibly getting it to slow down to a trot.

"I know you're worried, Luce." Yarne transforms back. "But this isn't like our time. Chrom's there, Robin's there, hell, even the boss is gonna be there."

"I know, Yarne." Lucina takes a deep breath. "But a part of me cannot deny the possibly that they will be lost again." She stares forward with a deep frown. "I know of a fate that we must prevent, and I will do everything in my power to make sure that we succeed."

"Yeah, yeah." Yarne's heard it before. They all have. "You're not going to succeed in doing anything if you drop dead of exhaustion before you get there."

Lucina's heard that one before, too. She has actually driven herself to the point of exhaustion multiple times and thus elected to sulk as a response.

"We've been rushing for the past week; it'll be maybe a day or two before we hit the battlefield if we go at the current pace." Kjelle's master says. "of course, if we go at Lucina's pace we can get there faster—"

"Don't encourage her." Kjelle mutters.

"—But we'll far too tired to be a benefit to the battle as a whole." Her master finishes. "A little patience goes a long way. In a fight against an army of that size, losses are guaranteed. Who are you trying to protect?" She asks.

Lucina flinches at the implication. "In our timeline, the parents of one of our friends die in that area…along with Khan Basilio and Flavia." She replies. "There is every risk that it will happen with this battle, instead of it happening some time in the future."

Yarne frowns. "Well…Inigo hasn't been born here yet, right? So since he's alive, the odds of them actually dying in this battle is pretty low."

"'Pretty low' is not a valid estimate." Laurent says. "Regardless of what the boss says." He adds when Yarne tries to object.

"That's true." Yarne grumbles. "Either way, us reinforcing isn't going to help if we die getting there."

…

…

…

For the next two days the Risen army continued to move in their wildly erratic fashion, steadily creeping closer to the Ylissean border while the Good Guys army did everything they could to whittle down the numbers.

"I've never had such a demoralizing fight." Robin commented at the end of day two. "Even though I know we're doing damage, the mob doesn't seem to care about it at all."

"On top of everything, the daily Risen drops are interfering with our efforts." Chrom agreed. "I don't like this feeling."

"You and me both." Ash agreed. _It feels like we're trying to defuse a bomb and we can't see the timer._

"In any case, talking about it won't solve anything." Robin sighed. "Go to bed. We're starting early tomorrow."

…

…

…

The third day brought them an interesting gift.

"It's that girl." Robin said as Ash checked on Magna's condition.

"That girl?" Ash turned to look. "Oh, it's Nah." Indeed it was. "But it looks like she's wearing some really bulky armor."

And she was.

"You know her?" Robin glances at Ash as Nah walked into the camp. "What's her relationship with Nowi? How do you know her?"

"We met when I ran away from the Longfort." Ash says loud enough for Nah to hear him. "Yo, Nah."

"Hello." Nah curtseys politely (and a little stiffly). "I've heard about the Risen army, and I'm here as a mercenary…I'll gladly give any assistance I can."

"A merc? Really?" Chrom frowns. "Forgive me for saying so, but you don't look the type…even with equipment."

Nah had her normal red/white outfit, plus: metal shoulder guards, an X-shaped flight thruster on her back, metal arm guards, a pair of metallic something on her waist, wind shoes, a cylinder thing strapped to her left arm, and a railgun on her right.

Ash stared at her equipment. _Wow, future me couldn't have been more obvious about his favorites._

"You know…" Robin says slowly. "Your equipment looks a lot like what Ash would cook up."

Nah glances at Ash. "I think my armorer and him would share many similarities."

Virion! "I believe that we are in no condition to refuse help." He gushes. "Especially from a beauty such as this lady."

Ash felt the need to slap someone.

Nah took it in stride. "With my equipment, I'll be able to offer close air support as necessary. Miss…"

"Robin."

Nah curtseys again. "Lady Robin, direct me as you will."

"You can fly with that thing?" Ash says incredulously. "Hell, I can't even fly with my wings."

Magna boffs Ash on the head with a wing.

"It is a special make, as he would call it." Nah says, adjusting her red cloak slightly to show the two shining Dragonstones around her waist. "And as such they would only work for me."

_So Future me weaponized her Manakete powers? _Ash frowns. "They don't hurt you, do they?"

"Not anymore." Nah replies.

Ash's frown deepened. He resolves to have a chat with Nah about her equipment after the battle was over.

"Well, if you're done over there, we're starting." Robin claps Ash on the shoulder. "I'm placing her under your command, Ash. Take care of the sky for us and watch for my signals."

"Gotcha. C'mon, Nah."

…

The two of them take to the air, and Ash marvels at the streaks of golden particles being emitted from Nah's metallic wings.

"How do those work?" He couldn't help but ask.

"I don't know either." Nah shrugs. "I think the future boss left something in it for you, but…"

"Yeah, I'll take a look later…I imagine I'll need to if I plan to maintain it somehow." Ash nods, and then turn to observe the Risen army from his seat in the sky. "Did a Risen army of this size ever show up in your timeline?" He asks Nah.

Robin fires a "Commence Attack" flare. Ash and Nah fire into the Risen mob at random with their railguns. (Good thing they fire nails, huh?)

"Not really…well, an army of this size never showed up when we were in a situation to muster an organized resistance." Nah says. "But there has been an army that showed up here before."

_Really now? _"What happened then?" Ash asks.

"Well…" Nah looks back worriedly at where Chrom was operating. "In the operation, Ferox lost almost half of their Khans and a vast majority of their elite forces…"

_Shit, so Lon'qu and Olivia are in possible danger. _Ash thought.

"And…this is unconfirmed, but…" Nah sees another signal from Robin and move to assist Basilio's unit with Ash. "Supposedly, Chrom or someone close to Chrom suffers a fatal wound in that fight."

…

_So…chapter 13 happened here? _Ash's heart was pounding. _This is bad, this is really bad…no, don't get distracted. Focus on taking out the enemy one at a time._

…

The skirmishing went well into the midday…and then suddenly, as if a switch was flipped, every Risen screamed into the air.

"Holy fucking shit." Ash says as he gets Magna under control again. "What's going on?"

"Risen Warcry." Nah says, shaken. "This means there's someone or something strong enough to control the Risen to their own ends."

_Well, that doesn't sound dangerous at all. _Ash thought glumly. "So right now…"

"They're moving according to someone's control." Nah scans the writhing ground. "Help me find their command units; we're going to take them out while we still have the chance."

Ash looked down for a shiny unit, but couldn't find any under the mass of writhing vapor zombie flesh. "Got it."

Nah fired a series of flares into the air.

…

"Full retreat?" Basilio scowls. "Is he insane?" He shakes his head. "…can't be. Alright, we're pulling out! Don't get left behind!" He yells to his men.

"Why are we pulling out? The Risen are just squeamish." One of his fighters grumbles.

"Our boy in the sky's getting skittish, I bet." His friend agrees. "But it never hurts to be careful, especially when we're up again…shit! Boss! Behind you!"

Basilio swung his axe behind him and cut the charging Risen in half. As the pieces of the Risen continued to fly past him (while evaporating) Basilio turned…and saw nothing but Risen charging for him. "Yep, we're out." He muttered. "Move it! Move!"

…

"They're going after Basilio first." Nah observes. "Boss, your orders?"

_Nah probably has more leadership experience than I do at this point. _Ash though idly. "We'll fly CAS and cover Basilio's retreat. Watch out for friendly fire."

"Understood. Commencing Close Air Support." Nah replies and aims her rifle. "Firing."

"Stay on my wing, we'll circle the defensive position." Ash says and tugs on Magna's reins, orienting them towards Basilio's bald head and massive fuckoff Axe of Risen Murder.

_The dude is killing like five Risen per each exaggerated swing._

"Nah, you get first pick. Your gun has better penetration anyways." Ash says.

"Roger."

…

"Looks like we got some help." Basilio grins as he grabs a Risen who lunged for him by the claw. With a sharp tug he dragged the Risen closer to him and punched the Risen's hooded head clean from its body. "Lookin' good up there, girly!" He yells into the sky.

Nah self-consciously tugs at her skirt even though there was nothing her to worry about.

"Basilio, I got orders for you!" Ash yells as he swoops down to fire at the charging Risen.

"Yeah? Let's hear it!" Basilio yells back, swinging wildly to cut down the incoming Revenants as if they were nothing.

_But they were something. Thousands upon thousands of something._

"Your unit is to fall back to point A and join up with Chrom!" Ash yells. "Fucking hell these guys are loud." He mutters to himself and shoots one of the screaming Risen in the mouth. "We're moving to Plan B!"

"Oh, it's that bad?" Basilio laughs. "Alright lads, we're riding to the Prince's rescue! Move yer ass!"

"Shit. Too low, Magna! Go up!" Ash takes up his poleaxe and swings at some of the Risen that were jumping to get at him. "Son a bitch, these guys got real violent real fast."

"Boss!" Nah moves to put something into her left hand.

"I'm fine, we're fine." Ash reassures her as he climbs back up to a safe altitude.

"Uh…right." Nah takes a deep breath, but doesn't let go of whatever was in her left hand. She does, however, return to sniping down targets.

The two of them cover Basilio's unit for another five minutes as the unit regroups against the sudden influx of Risen attackers before moving to assist Flavia's flanks.

"Ooh…my goodness." Nah breathes. "Flavia's unit broke so quickly?"

"She stretched her men out further to cover a wider line." Ash says. "Might be why…do you see Flavia anywhere?"

Nah squints at the horizon. "I think…yes!"

Ash follows her finger to a circular flurry of purple smoke. _In retrospect, I should've expected that. _He thought. "Let's go, commence CAS!"

…

…

Chrom, now on foot, charged shoulder-first into a Revenant about to decapitate an unhorsed Paladin.

"This is endless." He growled as he ran through the Risen with the Falchion. "Robin, how does it look?"

"Bad." Robin says simply, thrusting with a lance she plucked from a dead Paladin. "We've managed to curb our losses so far by having the extra mercs cover for the injured, but this won't last. We don't have the manpower to take on all of the Risen in a fight…as expected."

"Reinforcements?" Chrom asks as Robin sweeps a flank of Risen with a Thoron.

"They're bogged down fighting the Risen that detached from the main force. And here I thought it would be a concerted attack too." Robin growls. "Whoa!"

She gets tossed off of her horse when a Revenant jumped at its head and tore it off.

Chrom dispatched the Revenant. "Are you alright?"

"I'm still alive." Robin gets back on her feet. "Keep everyone together, we'll regroup at point A. Mercs! Grab lances and form a two-fold line, we'll retreat in order!"

…

…

Meanwhile, Ash and Nah just rescued Flavia (or more precisely, reduced the amount of Risen she has to deal with at any given time).

"Boss, I'm out of nails." Nah reported.

"That's fine…we're about done out here anyways." Ash replies. "Flavia, are you alright?" He calls to the ground.

"We're alive, though bruised pretty hard." Flavia tosses the broken hilt of her sword into the oncoming Risen (it gets lodged in one of the Revenant's hoods and kills it). "How does it look from up there?"

"Shit hit the fan type bad." Ash replies. "The Risen are swarming like bees and they're constantly looking for things to kill. Get to point A and group up with Chrom."

"Does he know that we're coming?" Flavia looks around and sees about a hundred men alive.

"He should." Ash replies after a brief pause. "We'll cover your tail, so hurry up."

_Nah attaches a long, blade-like something to the side of her rifle._

"I think it takes more than just the two of you to handle what's coming for us." Flavia noted, as she saw thousands of Risen shamble towards her men.

"If you get a move on we won't have to, now hurry it up." Ash replied.

"Cheeky bastard." Flavia grins. "Form up, we're moving out!"

…

"Saying that's all fine and good." Ash mutters as Magna flies over the Risen and catches their attention (making almost all of them hop for him). "But we can't actually fight them even if we have all of our units concentrated."

"That won't be a problem." Nah confidently declares as she closes her eyes. Her dragonstones glow in response.

Nah takes a deep breath, and

[1st Person Camera]

Shoots FIRE from her very human mouth and it's utterly adorable and very firey at the same.

Just…try and not even open your mouth all the way. Like...she's just exhaling, except instead of her breath being slightly warmer it's a stream of all consuming fire that's burning its way through everything it touches.

I will say though, the stream of fire has almost no spread, so it…it's not so much "flamethrower" as "really long blowtorch".

Regardless, she's doing like a hundred times more damage than I am, especially since she's flying over the Risen swarm and burning them down at the same time.

_So what can we do?_

Follow her and make sure nothing unusual happens.

…

…

[Point A]

Point A was a small hill, with a sparse but very wide forest set between them and the Risen army. Robin's logic on picking the position was that the Risen didn't care about cover, so it was a lot more helpful to see them coming instead of having the pissed off zombies suddenly appearing from behind a tree…but at the same time having some kind of visual cover was useful, and thus Robin chose the compromise of hiding behind a lot of light forests.

The hill helped.

Point A, incidentally, was a fallback position with a full medical staff and defenses.

"See to the injured." Maribelle ordered her staff (Clerics and dismounted Troubadours). "I take it the battle isn't going well." She says regally to Robin.

"Yeah. For some reason the Risen suddenly went crazy. I won't be surprised if they come down on this camp soon." Robin says darkly. "Get Chrom some treatment even if you have to nail him down; he didn't get away unscathed back there."

Maribelle glances at her unhurt-looking commander. "On it." She then proceeded to strong arm Chrom into a healer's tent regardless of his objections.

Robin waited until they were out of sight, before she tossed her sword into the ground with such force that it sank blade-first up to its hilt.

"Not happy with the outcome, I see." She heard and looked around.

Flavia trudged into the camp, tired and bleeding, with her ramshackle force of fifty men.

"What happened?" Robin asks as Flavia collapses onto the floor.

"After the Risen went insane? We got ambushed." Flavia shakes her head. "The Risen were hanging out behind a hill, just waiting for us, it felt like."

"Tactics, huh…" Robin made a very tiger-like growl. "Unbelievable."

"Think they'll come here?" Flavia asks as a healer helps her back onto her feet.

Robin nods. "Definitely. As soon as we collect all of our manpower, we'll pull back to point B."

"Ever thought about calling the whole thing off?" A gruff voice asks.

Basilio with his retinue of 150 fighters enter from the other side of the camp, looking much better than Flavia. "We got off easy. They stopped chasing us almost as soon as we got out of sight." He explains.

"I would consider pulling back to fight a different day." Robin says. "But considering the circumstances, if we let this obviously smart army run amok in Ferox the entire country will collapse."

"Economical damage from them devastating the countryside." Basilio agrees as Flavia disappears into a healer tent. "I haven't heard from any of the other Khans, so they're probably either still holding out…or dead."

Robin grits her teeth. "This is the worst."

"Hey, hey. Easy." Basilio pats her on the shoulder. "Don't blame yourself for something you have no control over."

"I'll remember that." Robin grumbles. "Now go and get treated."

"Yes, ma'am." Basilio grins.

Robin takes a few deep breathes, alone again, and decides to retrieve her sword from the earth as stress relief.

After getting her sword back (and cleaning it on her robe) she heard a low roar in the sky and looked up too see Ash and Magna landing in the base. The girl with them (Nah) descended with her weird flying X on her back, flew parallel to the ground, and then turned around to slow down and land…and then slid and tripped into Robin, knocking the strategist over.

_Yep. Nowi's kid. _Ash thought offhandedly and hopped off of Magna. "You girls ok?"

"Sorry, Lady Robin, uhm…" Nah rubs her head. "Are you alright?"

"Yeah." Robin's flat on the ground. "I'm alright. I'm feeling a little vexed though."

Ash and Nah share a "was that a pun" glance.

Robin holds an arm up, and Ash pulls her back to her feet.

"How does it look from the air?" Robin asks him.

"Mostly bad." Ash sighs. "The Risen are spreading out like a fucking tidal wave, but a large portion of them were following me."

"And…"

"I flew around as many obstacles as I could. I don't know if it shook them off though." Ash shrugs. "Though for the sake of safety…"

"Assume no." Robin finishes for him. "Do you think Valm might be responsible for this? It seems to be too much of a coincidence."

_I think it actually is just a coincidence, _Ash thinks. _Unless someone's pissed that I cheated my way through chapter twelve. _"No, if they were using the Risen their own country wouldn't be in such a mess."

Robin mulls that over for a minute. "In light of the estimates on the Valm warships, do you believe in the news of their economic state?"

Ash frowns. _She thinks we might've been fed bad info._ "Good point…though I believe it, since I don't think Valm can exercise complete information control over every news source."

"If you say so." Robin sighs, and the two take a seat on the ground, facing where the Risen army would be.

_Nah sets her equipment aside so she can sit next to them._

"Do you think we can win?" Robin asks nobody in particular after five minutes of silence.

"With what we've got now? Not likely." Ash laughs sadly. "We've got, what, five hundred soldiers here, and a quarter of them are healers…and healers aren't useful when the soldiers die in one or two hits."

"I saw." Robin says. "They had skills I never recognized before."

"Oh, really?" Ash turns his head slightly to look.

"Yeah…two of them." Robin brings up a hand to count.

[1st Person Camera]

The skills are as follows (Robin named these, so I dunno if she read them or if she came up with them)

The first skill is All For One. Revenant deals (up to) 500% damage, takes (up to) 500% damage. If this was the game, that skill wouldn't matter too much (because Revenants suck) but this is reality. People get tired when they dodge too much…run out of room, mess up a parry, Risen get lucky, whatever. A touch is practically a kill. I don't know how it would resolve in the game though with regard to defenses, but it doesn't really matter, because…

The second skill is Vaporized Claws. Revenant attack (which is physical) hits as if it was a magical attack (checked against resistance), and deals extra damage if it has to go through armor. There was no numeric value that Robin could see, but it doesn't take a genius to figure out that getting hit by those claws is seriously bad news.

I think the second skill might be why Flavia's troops had more trouble. She had led mostly Mercenary (the unit class) and Armor Knights, while Basilio had mostly Fighters and Brigands. Their actual defensive skill didn't matter, only the fact that the claws tore through physical armor…which the axe users had practically none of.

_Might be why Chrom is more or less safe, too. The guy's armor isn't too hefty to begin with._

Anyways, stack those two skills together and you get almost a million Revenants tailored to kill literally everyone who fights without magic…and would probably slice anyone who does use magic to ribbons, because claws are still physical objects and hurt like a bitch.

"I wonder if this means that the Risen can evolve." Robin lies down and asks the sky. "If they do, we're all very dead."

"Well, this batch is special, so maybe, just maybe." We cross our fingers. "They can't."

"You give me so much confidence." Robin laughs.

"That's what I'm here for." We smile as well.

_I think we made Nah uncomfortable._

Since she's here…we turn to Nah. "Mind if I take a look at your gear?" We ask her.

We caught her daydreaming? "Eh? Uh…yes, of course." Nah passes over her railgun plus option.

…

What is this build?

It looks like a tube with a trigger (and stock) attached to it. It's obviously breech-loaded and uses a more sophisticated version of the reloader system we have right now. I'm assuming the rail component is shielded in the blocky metal sheath around the outside?

But the more interesting feature is the set of braces attaching it to the option, which is a blade…so this is a bayonet designed to kill infantry? The blade is almost as long as the rifle itself. It's like if someone looked at a razorblade and went "y'know what, I bet we can make this into a weapon if we scaled it up."

"I usually remove the blade since it affects my aim." Nah explains. "Normally it stays on the rifle until we have to take it off."

"Normally? Who else has something like this?" Robin asks (the sky, still).

"Eh…just me now." Nah says uncomfortably. "Nobody else liked using them since the blade made it hard to handle without causing self-harm."

Future me, you are a butt.

_We set the railgun aside._

Lessee…what else?

…

[In summary]

In summary…

I don't know what the cylinder does, the X on her back is similar to the thruster wings we made for the Plegian war, but do not use spell paper for their propulsion…her wind shoes are closer to her thruster than my wind shoes. Her shoulder pads and arm guards appear to be just normal armor, but they're easily detachable and I don't see why she needs them, and the things around her waists are claws of some kind, and again, I don't see why she needs them.

_Her equipment seem to be outfitted with the express purpose of making her as powerful in her human form, if not more so, than her dragon form._

All the equipment seem to share one point in common: they're powered by Nah's Dragonstones…somehow_._ I don't understand it, I do understand why future me would do it, since the stones apparently provide so much power Nah can fly and fight at the same time with them.

"If I need more mobility, I can use a third pair of wings." Nah had commented when we were messing round with her X-thrusters. "But otherwise it's much more efficient to fly with just these two."

_We assumed that she was talking about growing a pair of wings for agility (like Myrrth from FE8, though she didn't grow her wings at will and it was just a permanent part of her portrait and sprite)._

In that case would it make her closer to Fazilla? Since her wings were visible only on her sprite.

_Fa. From FE6 (also in FE7 on the map where you get Hawkeye)._

Wasn't Fazilla also a divine dragon or something? I vaguely remember her being special even for a Manakete.

_From a bloodlines standpoint, Nah is closer to Sophia in that both are mixed blood Manaketes._

But Nah can transform and Sophia can't. Also Nah didn't join as a level 1 shaman.

_Different era of games…and different continents, too. For all we know Sophia could've transformed if she had a Dragonstone._

True, I guess.

_Robin had observed us impassively while we messed around with Nah's equipment._

"If I didn't know better I would've pegged you for Virion." She says after we're done with her gear.

_Nah turns a slight shade of red._

"Our interest is professional in nature." I stare into Robin's eyes, as if issuing a challenge. "She is adorable, though." We concede.

"Yes, yes she is." Robin says after staring at Nah (who gets progressively more fidgety and red). "Come here."

Nah, utterly confused, obeys the orders.

_She then squeaks in surprise when Robin pulls her into a hug._

"She's so huggable!" Robin laughs.

"I know, right?" We grin in response.

Nah sputters something but Robin seems hell-bent on cuddling the daylights out of Nah.

…

After…what, the ten minute hug session (which left Robin's spirits restored and Nah…well, a little bit disconcerted) Robin had the camp gather up and moved to Point B.

"Prioritize on moving the wounded first. Ash, get up in the air and observe the Risen's movements. It's fine if you lead them here." Robin ordered.

"Aye aye. Magna, you ready to fly?" We look over to Magna, who's rolling around three empty barrels under his talons. He growls affirmative and stands up. "Nah, head on over to Point B and scope out points of attack."

"We'll be guarding that place for as long as we can, right?" Nah asks (Robin nods in response). "Understood, I'll head there right now."

Welp, let's do this thing.

…

[Point B, about three hours later.]

…

Ugh…so tired.

_The Halloween girls train to fly for longer than this. Grow a spine._

Yeah, yeah…Point B looks like it's coming along fine from up here.

Robin picked…I guess this place would qualify as a ravine? It's a pretty shallow ravine if it is. The camp is set up behind a round hill, but something tore through the hill and now it looks like a giant flat screw from up here. She's got fortifications erected such that they will corral the Risen to the kill zone set up at the exit of the ravine…she does have extra lances, right? I don't think those flimsy walls will hold against the super powered claws…

…?

I see a Pegasus down there.

Given that the entirety of the Feroxi air force is devoted elsewhere right now, I wonder who it could be?

_Cynthia? She's about the only one who could reach here in less than four or five days._

I guess. Let's go down and see.

_We land._

Ohey, it is Cynthia, and…she…

"What in the hells is going on here?" I ask incredulously.

"Oh! Hey, Boss! We're here to help!" Cynthia waves and replies cheerfully…while tied to her saddle.

"It happens often." Gerome sighs. "Best to just roll with it."

…I…what? It happens often? She…she…I'm assuming she did it herself, given how cheerful she is about it, but FUCKING hell.

"Desperate times and all that." Cynthia grins. "I'm just like that one guy you talked about. Lameo."

_She pronounced it like 'Romeo'._

La…Tamerlane? Oh, I am so sorry, Tammy. To have your history of…rape and pillage be so…ok I guess I really don't care.

"She really does this often?" Robin asks, incredulous.

…Oh shit Chrom is in attendance WARNING WARNING CYNTHIA TAKE A HINT STOP GLOWING

_Fortunately nobody else is around; we're very close to the command tent._

"Yeah!" Cynthia throws the V-sign into Robin's face. "Hey, I come from a time where air power was a premium and being crippled means being dead, so give me a little credit."

Fuck.

_We buried our head in our hands and buried our hands in Magna's back. Magna growls in confusion._

"You ok over there, Ash?" Chrom raises an eyebrow.

"What do you mean, 'time'?" Robin scowls. "You can't possibly be a manakete."

"I'm not. She is." Cynthia points to Nah.

_Robin goes wide eyed._

"She's what?"

"You didn't know?" Cynthia sounds surprised. "Ne, bossman. Why didn't you tell them?"

_We growl in frustration._

"Is…is there something I'm missing here?" _Chrom looks between Cynthia and us, while sounding very concerned._ "Ash, are you alright?"

"Don't worry about him, dad. He's fine." Cynthia says lightly.

…

_There is a brief pause._

_For dramatic effect._

…

…

…

See? That right there. That RIGHT there is why LUCINA is the hero of the children. God dammit! The Hero wannabe has ZERO fucking sense of WHEN to properly make a reveal, and instead of the heartwarming Chrom meet Lucina moment we have _(We look up to check the scene) _EVERYONE staring at CYNTHIA while she looks around like a FUCKING idiot.

_To be fair this was going to happen eventually._

I know, but still.

"He's your what now?" Robin glances at Chrom. "He's not old enough to be your father…Cynthia, was it?"

"He is though." Cynthia pouts. "I'm a knight from the future, and you better remember that."

Oh well. It's not like it was a hand worth holding.

_We sigh deeply and tiredly._

"Robin…and Chrom." I get their attention. "The thing is…"

…

[Exposition]

…

"I…see." Robin frowns. "It's a little difficult to believe that she would be your daughter…hair color aside." She says.

Robin has made that comment when I properly introduced Cynthia. We've since tied her shirt down to prevent her from actually stripping to show off the mark. Which she has tried.

"So…she would be Lucina's sister?" Chrom's…a little slow on the uptake.

"Yep. The cuter one, too." Cynthia's grin is without shame or remorse.

"And the annoying one." Severa sneers. "Lucina's a hundred times more mature than she'll ever be."

The two get into a minor catfight.

"So…I take it all the mercenaries under her command are future children?" Robin asks me. I nod. "So who are Severa's parents?"

Given how things are turning out? "Cordelia…and Fredrick, I think."

"She's not inheriting Fredrick's hair color, I see." Robin remarks on Severa's bright red hair. I think it might be dyed, I'm not sure. "Nor his even temper." She adds as the two frenemy girls turn away from each other and pout.

_Side note: frenemy is a recognized word in Microsoft Word._

"She's…more of her mother's girl." To be honest, I don't actually know much about the future kids. I never paid a lot of attention to their support conversations beyond the ones they get with their parents and Robin. I have that problem with pretty much all the characters past chapter 13, actually.

"And she's not a flyer? Why?" Robin asks…loud enough for Severa to hear.

_Severa visibly bristles._

"Touchy subject, I see…my apologies." Robin mutters. "And…the man with the mask is…Gerome. Cherche's kid? I think that's Minerva with him."

She's got good eyes. Gerome and his Minerva nods in response.

"Uh…" Robin glances at Nah and stops. I guess Nowi has never transformed in front of her yet. "She's not your kid, is she?" She asks us after a minute. "You two seem kinda close."

I dunno. I don't think so.

"I am not." Nah shakes her head. "He is our superior and officer, and none of us are related to him."

"Really? Well, that's a bummer." Robin sighs and earns a glare from us. "What?"

"Are we really standin' around chatting about heritage?" Brady growls. "Don't we have an army to fight?"

"Maribelle's kid." Robin says _immediately. _When she catches our surprised stare… "Hey, I've heard how she talks when she gets hissy and think nobody's watching."

Hehe~

"No worries, Brady. We're as prepared as we can possibly be." Robin reassures him…and continues to guess the children.

"You…I don't know." She addresses Noire next.

Noire bows in response. "I am the child of Tharja, Lady Robin."

Robin…goes for a bit of a grope, getting a surprised gasp in response. "Ok, I can see that now." Robin sighs. "Am I really beaten out by a child?"

She's not _that _young.

_Robin glares at us_. "Don't answer that."

_Thumbs up from us. _Got it.

"So, you mentioned Lucina…are there more of you?" Robin asks Severa.

Severa salutes. "Yes, ma'am." Now that I look at it, Severa's salute is very similar to the ones my squadron uses. "Lucina has her small party, and if she has heard of the news here then she should be heading here right now."

"Besides her, we also have Owain and Inigo, but they're in Valm so they're not helping." Cynthia huffs. "The jerks."

"Huh…looks like there are a lot of you. So…I'm guessing that Morgan kid also came from the future." Robin mulls.

"Morgan? Who's Morgan?" Cynthia looks surprised.

…Wait, really?

"You've never heard of Morgan?" I ask her.

"Nope." She says confidently. "No Morgans in our outfit."

…huh.

Well, I guess this establishes that the Morgan we have came from a different timeline.

_It's entirely possible that we ended up marrying Robin, and then she died before she could give birth to Morgan._

Possible, but not very probable. If you think about it, any scenario where the good guys are on the back foot would happen due to something involving Robin…either she goes over to Grima's side, or if she's taken out of the picture early, so the odds of us getting married post-game is pretty low, if not nonexistent.

…I guess I shouldn't be worried about that now, huh?

"So…did you not have a kid?" Robin points to me.

"Not that I know of." I shrug. "Future me was a bit of dick, if I heard it from Lucina right."

"She's biased." Cynthia replies immediately. "Well…she's not really wrong, but she's biased."

Gee. Thanks.

"Apparently future me got married real late and…well, shit happened." I frown.

Even though I know it's not technically me in that story, recounting it still gives me a bad taste in my mouth.

"I see." Robin thinks for a bit. "So who would be my kid?"

Morgan.

"I hope he's had a happier life." Robin laughs lightly. "Better than what we're about to go through."

…

I didn't notice the low roar of the Risen in the background. They're still far away, but definitely coming closer.

_Robin rushes off to direct the main force._

"Alright, let's get this party started." I say.

_The future kids immediately look to us._

It's a little disconcerting.

"Noire, you're on the walls, snipe all targets of opportunity."

"Got it." _Noire takes out a bow…it looks way heavier than your average steel bow. She also has like four quivers of arrows._

"Gerome, you're flying support with me. We'll direct the Risen towards the killzone."

"Understood." Gerome has a scythe. Why did future me give him a scythe. It's like twice as long as my poleaxe, too.

"Brady, cover the archer team."

Brady spins his heal staff in his hands. "Nobody's gonna die on my watch, just you wait."

Last is… "Nah."

Nah hefts her railgun. "I'll cover the killzone."

Good girl.

"What am I gonna do?!" Cynthia demands. "I'm usually the anti-ground attacker here!"

Really? "I would've figured you for a dogfighter. Future me really made you hit ground targets?"

We made Cynthia mad. "What's that supposed to mean?!"

"It means you should be a good girl and provide recon support over the killzone." Gerome…Gerome smirked at her.

"Urk." Cynthia pouts. "Fine, I'll do that. Gimme some javelins."

_Gerome tosses a quiver of javelins to Cynthia, who catches it and latches it expertly to her Pegasus._

I can't help staring at her legs tied to the saddle. It looks so…weird.

"I'm off!" Cynthia takes off into the sky. "Stars Leader, beginning aerial recon and support operation! Let's Goooo~!"

"Leader, she says." Gerome huffs. "Captain, let's go."

Me? "Yeah. Magna, take off." _We take off into the air with Gerome flying on our wing. _"Hey, Gerome. Did future me have a callsign?"

"He did not. He only flew solo missions." Gerome replies. "As Cynthia would say, he had no friends."

Future me, you are a butt.

"Sheesh…alright, we are now Condor squadron."

"I see. Condor two, ready to support the ground defense operation." Gerome says.

"Condor One, roger." We ready our poleaxe. "Go!"

…

"This sucks." Cynthia pouts as she watches the two Wyvern Riders head into the ravine. "I wanna go on a rampage too. Oh well." She pulls out a few Javelins as the Risen start flooding towards the camp. "I'm just glad he didn't chew me out for flying with bad legs." _Besides, it's not like I can tackle serious combat like this. _She thought. _So I suppose an op like this makes the most sense._

"Here they come." She mutters, before loading a Javelin into something resembling a handheld catapult.

_An electrified catapult for firing things like javelins with excessive force._

She swoops down as low as she could and fires the javelin at the oncoming Risen, running it (and about six others behind it) through before she rises out of claw range again. "Guess I can't do that very often, huh?" Cynthia mutters when she sees the archers in camp let loose onto the Risen coming in.

The Risen eventually make their way down the ravine and clash onto two three layer thick walls of pikemen Robin had set up.

"Why Pikemen?" Chrom asks (also with a lance, stabbing away as hard as he could). "A dense formation like this hasn't been seen for centuries."

"Against super close range enemies like these it'll be plenty." Robin says confidently as she takes aim with a bow. "We just need to kill as many as we can before we need to run." She puts a spiraling gust of wind on her arrow and let it loose into the Risen, probably killing a number greater than one.

"You don't think we can take them all out?" Chrom asks as a Risen's lucky grab snaps the lance in his hands.

Robin shakes her head. "Not with these numbers."

_Chrom tosses the broken lance like a Javelin into the Risen lines and kills a number greater than one._

Robin glances up as flares catch her attention. "Message from Ash. Risen are breaking off and headed towards our flanks." She mutters. "There seems to be less of them than expected."

Robin fires off flares into the air in response.

…

"She wants us to switch to the flanks already?" Ash mutters when he sees the flares. "Got it. Gerome, on me."

"Ok."

…

Robin then heard a very distinct laugh.

"AHAHAHAHAHAHA! YOUR NUMBERS MEAN NOTHING! YOUR SAVAGE PURPLENESS MEAN NOTHING! I AM DEATH! I AM FEAR!" Noire…er, says.

_If her switch is flipped then she has exactly one level of voice, and that's batshit insane, so… _

"I GOT ONE FOR ALL OF YOU BAGFACES!" Noire doesn't slow down with her powerful arrows.

Ash glances worriedly at the camp, upon hearing Noire's loud and clear voice.

"I AM THUNDER! I AM DEATH! I AM THE GREAT GENERAL OF DARKNESS! AHAHAHAHA~!"

"What the fuck did future me show her?!" Ash demands of the Risen.

…

"Targets sighted." Nah suddenly reports. "The main line of entry is full of targets. Clearing house."

"Eh?" Robin snaps around to look at Nah, who was now floating a full head above the defensive line with her railgun pointed towards the Ravine. "What do you mean, 'clearing house?'"

Nah's response was to attach a set of four extra rails to her gun. "Charging large scale anti-Risen cannon, loading line leader."

Robin didn't understand what the little flying red riding hood was going on about, but she's seen enough of what Ash could make (and could extrapolate well enough) to know that whatever the girl was holding was going to be seriously bad news for the Risen.

"Rail pair one…rail pair two…charge…stabilized…" Nah mutters, going over her mental checklist while regulating the power of her Dragonstones. "Backdraft check…" Nah glances behind her. "Clear. Levelling…" She put extra power into her mechanical wings. "…Clear. Recoil compensation…" Nah's dragon wings sprout from her back. "Clear."

"Wow…so she really was a manakete." Robin breathes, transfixed by the sight of Nah aiming a gun as long as she was tall toward the ravine.

"What is she muttering, anyways?" Chrom wonders.

"Ok…all conditions clear." Nah flies up a little higher to avoid catching the Pikemen in the blast. "Overcharging!"

Nah's gun glowed a bright, eye-burning orange as particles emitted from both the gun's attached rails…and her Dragonstones.

"Shield your eyes, everyone! Fanelia…discharge!" Nah declares, and pulls the trigger.

_The trigger was the size of her hand._

A bright orange beam threw itself out of the gun and into the ravine filled with Risen, drowning out their shrieks and cries with its roar and burning the already very squishy Revenants into their purple vapor components.

The other soldiers (and pretty much everyone) squeezed their eyes shut per Nah's suggestion, and could only hear the roar of the weapon for the next thirty seconds as Nah poured as much energy as she dared into the gun, making sure that everything from her to the end of the Ravine was absolutely and utterly fucking dead from now 'til forever.

…

"Sweet lord of jesus." Ash breathed when he saw the beam. "Future me, you're a genius butt."

…

As Nah's weapon stopped roaring and the soldiers realized that the insides of their eyelids were no longer lit up like the sun, everyone opened their eyes and saw…the Ravine, now devoid of enemies, charred black, and a little bit deeper than before.

"Whew." Nah takes a deep breath and unhooks the four spent rods from her gun. They drop to the ground and shatter on impact. "I need a breather now."

"Woo! Good shot, Nah!" Cynthia yells from her spot high (REALLY high) in the sky. "You're the bestest little girl ever!"

Nah rolls her eyes and sits on the ground, taking deep, measured breathes to regain her energy.

"What…what WAS that?!" Robin demands as the Risen fill in to the killzone again (and the Pikemen get back to business). "How…what was that?"

"This?" Nah holds up another packet of four rods. "These are the large scale weapon attachments for my gun. Boss calls it the Fanelia option."

"Seriously?" Robin breathes, looking towards the spot where Ash was directing Risen traffic. "Did he mass produce it?"

"The rods, yes." Nah nods. "But the amount of energy required to actually use them make fielding the weapon on a large scale impractical." _I can only use it because I have two stones. _Nah added in her head. _Mother could do it with just her stone when she was still alive, and Lady Tiki could wield two of them in tandem…but then again, Lady Tiki had a specially made one._

"I imagine the weapon can only be used by Manaketes, then." Robin says after thinking on it for a few seconds. "How quickly can you fire?"

"Not very." Nah admits. "It takes a long time for me to charge enough energy to use the weapon, and the Boss forbids using it too often as it is adverse to my well-being."

_And if I push her too hard then Ash will have my head. _Robin concludes. "Ok then. Take your time and rest, but if you don't believe that you can use the weapon again, then help out with just normal weapons."

Nah nods in reply and grabs a bow.

…

…

…

The battle lasts for rest of the day.

Robin, upon seeing the sun set, made a snap judgment. "We'll pulling out. A night fight against an enemy that cannot tire is the worst problem we can face." She declared. "All units, prepare to retreat!"

"Gotcha. We'll get the healer corps to move first." Brady acknowledged. "Noire! Let the air know, we need running cover!"

"SO IT HAS COME TO THIS!" Noire…says. "CYNTHIA!"

"I can hear you just fine up here…" Cynthia sighs. "Jeez. I need a more comfortable saddle." She squirms and reaches into a bag secured behind her. "It was here last time I checked…ah ha!" She pulls out a torch staff.

_The staff has a larger head than normal._

Cynthia closes her eyes channels her magical power into the staff, and it discharges one extremely bright, glowing orb.

…

"The hell was that?" Ash demanded when he felt the world light up.

"Cynthia just used a torch staff." Gerome replied, pulling up higher into the sky.

_Don't remember seeing it in game. _Ash followed him up. _Then again, a lot of things don't exist in game now._ "What does it mean?"

"It means we need to cause enough damage to let our allies escape unharmed." Gerome raises his scythe over his head. "A common retreating tactic we employed."

"I see." Ash pulls out a spellbook. "I'll back you up this time then. You know what you're doing."

"Understood." Gerome and Minerva lazily turn in the air before dropping like hammer onto the Risen heads. By using the momentum of his flight, Gerome cut deeply into the Risen's ranks with his scythe before pulling back up again.

"Well, I can't actually follow that." Ash mutters. "So I'll just sit and shoot instead." And so he does, by peppering the Risen on the ground with small balls of fire.

…

Severa glanced at the scythe gleaming with an unnatural orange soaring through the sky. "Gerome's brought out the reaper, huh?" She mutters. "I guess I should show off a little, too."

"About time." Nah (passing by) winks at her.

"Shush, squirt." Severa grins back in return before closing her eyes and focusing her magical power. Four Levin swords (two under the shield on her left arm, two hidden in the shin guards of her wind shoes) glowed orange and floated around her.

Severa cracked her knuckles menacingly and the four floating Levin Sword bits glowed with anticipation. "You can just sit back and let bit sis Severa take care of aaaall of this."

Nah laughs openly in response, drawing some odd looks from the healers hurrying to their wagons to get away from the zombie apocalypse. "Big sis Severa can have my leftovers when I'm done."

Severa fakes astonishment. "Whaat? Where'd you learn to talk like that? I want our cute, composed Nah back." She says as she tears a Revenant in half with a swing. Her Levin Sword bits discharge small pulses of energy into the Risens swarming the Pikemen, seemingly killing their targets on contact.

Nah simply rolls her eyes in response, not letting up on the firepower against the Revenants.

Noire pulls out something from within her hair and attach them onto her bow. When she channels her power into them, they too start glowing with that same orange energy and emit particles along the bow, making it look as if it had feathers.

Noire then unloads arrow after arrow into the Risen swarm, with each arrow piercing many ranks of the undead before shattering into the Earth accompanied by her demonic laughter.

Interestingly enough, Noire going utterly batshit insane had a positive impact on morale…the camp's personnel took her laughter as a kind of reassurance, in that so long as the crazy archer lady was laughing it up they were doing pretty ok.

_But as expected_

They were suddenly not doing so ok.

Noire's laughter was suddenly drowned out by the sound of wood shattering as one side of the camp was instantly torn down.

_So much for that. _Robin scowled. _I hoped they'd get distracted by our fliers longer. _She then blinked in alarm. _The rest of the healers are over there! Maribelle is over there!_

"Do not panic!" Maribelle shouted over the roar of the Risen as she skewered one with her parasol. "Move the injured! Hurry!" She felt a swipe miss her by inches, and heard her dress tear from the force of the swing. "You brute! This was my favorite dress!" She snapped as she tore the Risen's head off with a blast of wind.

Another Risen, through either sheer luck or stupidity, ran into her at full speed instead of using his claws. The impact sent Maribelle flying along the ground, where she slammed into a tent pole and lay choking for breath.

The Risen didn't feel like waiting.

Simultaneously, the other side of the camp was compromised by comparatively less Risen. Robin, who was closer to said other side of the camp, had a choice to make.

…

She gritted her teeth and rushed to engage the Risen closest to her. _She's fine. She'll make it. She'll be fine._

…

Maribelle strove to keep her eyes open and tried to prop herself up shakily on one hand. Her pulse resounded in her ears, and she could only focus on the Risen's glowing eyes as they advanced on her with their unnaturally fast shuffle.

_I guess…this is it?_ Maribelle thought with remarkable calmness. _I can't move…I can't breathe…_

The Revenant at the front raised its claw.

_Lisse…I'm going first. I'm sorry._

…

…

"MA!"

Maribelle's eyes snapped open.

Brady (though she didn't know it was him) had blocked the Risen's claw by shoving his heal staff into its palm.

Maribelle was confused. "Who…"

With practiced speed, Brady pulled his staff back, doublehanded it, and delivered a fast three-strike combo to the Risen, knocking it into its buddies and stunning them.

"Come and get it." Brady snarled, spinning the staff in his hand like a quarterstaff.

…

Maribelle didn't really registered what he yelled. She only knew that this…boy, this very frail boy, was putting his life on the line to protect her.

_What are you doing? _She wanted to yell. _Run! You can still make it! _She could see that he was rapidly losing breath despite his skill.

Case in point: Brady's healing staff was broken when he made a bad block against a Risen.

"Don't worry." Brady was unfazed. "We stand together."

Maribelle was confused.

Her confusion and shock escalated when a thunderstorm erupted around them, clearing away the Risen in a torrent of purple smoke.

She looked up in surprise as the Wyvern above her landed with a thud.

"You sure took your time, boss." Brady said as he gulped down a Vulnerary.

"Sorry. Flying took time." Ash hopped off, his demeanor dark. "Both of you, get on Magna and get out of here." Small, black orbs of magical energy formed around him. "Is she alright?"

"Yeah, she'll be just fine." Brady assured him as he hoisted Maribelle onto Magna's back. "You gonna be ok here, boss?"

Ash glared at the Revenants squeezing in from the entrance. "I think I'll manage." With a snap of his fingers, every piece of the dark power around him rushed towards the Risen.

…

Robin cleared the enemies on her side and saw the line of Pikemen pull back. "Have the healers evacuated yet?!" She asks in general. _Is Maribelle ok? _Was what she really wanted to say.

"They're gone, it's just us now!" Basilio replied, tower over the rest of Pikemen and using two lances at once, stabbing away like he was on a ski trip and didn't really know how to ski.

Robin wanted to ask more, but then saw Magna run by with a wounded-looking Maribelle on her back.

_She's alive. _Robin wanted to cheer. With that in mind, she now focused on getting the Pikemen out of the now three sided-attack.

_It's getting dark. The Risen can see in the dark, we can't. All it takes is for one person to trip in panic before everyone dies here. _Robin thought. _What do I do?_

"Oy, tactician." Severa tapped Robin on the shoulder.

"Huh? What?" Robin's gaze flickered between Severa and the floating Levin Sword Bits hovering around her shoulders.

"Give your soldiers a full retreat order. We'll bring up the rear." Severa said. "This isn't the first time we've done jobs like this." She adds when Robin tries to argue. "We can do it."

Robin saw Severa's gaze and saw that the girl was entirely serious. "I'll leave it to you." Robin nods.

As Robin rushes towards the Pikemen group to advise, she heard Severa yell something into the air.

…

The sky was then suddenly blanketed by a layer of particles that glowed a bright orange.

"You got two minutes!" Cynthia yells, eyes screwed shut and her torch staff leaking orange particles. "The staff is pretty old, after all!"

"Two minutes is plenty." Nah says before loading a set of bars onto her rifle again. "I'm using the Fanelia. Severa, can you help?"

"Yeah, how many do you need?" Severa reaches into a small pouch.

"All of them."

Severa glances at Nah.

Nah nods calmly in reply.

Severa shrugs. "Alright." She pulls out a set of sixteen small prisms and hooks them into small notches built into the hilt of her Levin Sword Bits. "Deploying Bits." Severa mutters as she focuses.

Chrom (accompanying the retreating army) took a glance back and saw Severa kind of standing there while Nah fiddled with her gun.

"Should we really just leave them?" Chrom asks Robin.

"The kid was serious." Robin replies. "I saw her eyes. This is…mundane, to them." She grits her teeth. _What did we do to leave those kids such a horrific future…?_

"Hell, seriously?" Basilio breathes. "I got the shakes when I saw those numbers, and you're telling me they're used to it?" He glances back. "Even that small kid?"

The small kid in question just hopped into the air again, the x on her back glowing with particles.

…

Severa waited until she could no longer feel the mental strain of keeping the Sword bits animated, a sign that they had transferred to Nah's control, before raising her sword into the air, letting its blade catch the artificial light of the spell over their heads.

The spell dissipated as its caster swooped down to pick up Severa and get the hell out of Dodge.

"Why did it have to be you?" Severa grumbles.

"You had a fifty fifty chance," Cynthia grins. "And we all know Gerome's a softie for Nah."

"Pah." Severa sighs. "Your legs…" She adds softly.

"They'll be fine." Cynthia reassures her buddy/enemy. "Nothing auntie Lissa can't fix. I can still fly like normal, too."

"No you're not." Severa says in alarm.

"Yes I am." Cynthia grins wider.

"No you're n-eeeeeeeeeeee!"

_Cynthia performed an aileron roll. It's not a barrel roll._

…

Nah heard Severa's shriek and shook her head, slowly backing away from the incoming Risen horde, the Levin Bits she borrowed from Severa floating in front of her sword arranged in a flowery pattern.

"Ok…" Nah mutters. "Energy regulation, ok…compensation…ok…density…ok…balancer…too low left." Her wings glow a little and her right side comes up a little. "check…all clear. Overcharging!"

Her gun glowed and orange particles poured out.

"What did the boss say when he first gave me these wings?" Nah wondered suddenly, before glancing up. "Oh…right! I can see the moon tonight!" Nah declares confidently.

Ash was within hearing range; he was retreating via his wind shoes after unloading all of his chain lightning shots into the Risen as revenge. _Please say it. _Ash thought idly.

Nah took a deep breath and jumped into the air. "Harmonica Satellite Cannon! Discharge!"

Her rifle, plus the Fanelia option, roared with its power again…but this time the beam struck the array of Levin Bits.

The Prisms on the bits scattered the beam into smaller pieces, and like a torrential downpour of light they struck the Risen with brutal force.

Nah, propelled backwards by the weapon discharge, carefully adjusted her aim to make sure that the Risen army was properly covered by the rain of light.

The Risen army, incidentally, was evaporating into purple smoke at an alarming rate.

"Jesus." Ash shook his head, having stopped to look. "I feel very weak compared to future me…it's a weird feeling." He said to nobody in particular.

…

After ninety seconds of blasting the everloving fuck out of the Risen, Nah's rain finally subsided. The four rods on her weapons disintegrated before she even purged them from her gun. Nah spent the rest of her consciousness returning the Levin Bits back into her free hand before her energy gave out and she fell from the sky.

"Oof!" Ash caught her. "Man, you're heavy…though it's probably just the armor."

"That's rude, boss…" Nah says sleepily.

"You ok?" Ash asks as he makes a retreat with his wind shoes…Nah killed a lot, but a lot was not all.

"Yeah…I just need a minute." Nah mumbles.

"Take all the time you need." Ash says soothingly, giving limp!Nah a tight hug while running away from the zombie apocalypse.

…

In the sky, Gerome shakes his fist in mock anger.

He also noted two groups of shadows (it was now fully dark) moving very rapidly towards the torch-bearing Pikemen troops.

…

The two groups did not notice the Wyvern over their heads…not that one of them particularly cared.

…

…

The Pikemen kept going until they had hit Point C, which was a small village next to a creek.

Unfortunately…

"Looks like somebody made it here before any of us could." Basilio growled.

The village was in shambles…the healing team, which had made it here earlier, was perfectly fine though.

"Oy, Flavia!" Basilio calls out. Flavia sticks her head out of a tented wagon. "What happened here?"

"How the hells am I supposed to know that?" Flavia replies tiredly. "When we arrived it was already like this."

Robin fired out orders. "Set up torches, make sure they cannot be seen outside of the camp. Erect barricades in the village, and move the tents. Hurry up."

The men did as they were told.

…

"Do you think the Risen will come back?" Chrom asks Robin.

_What made you think…well he's probably right. _Robin thought."I don't know. I hope not. It's more dangerous for us to move in the darkness than staying here anyways."

"That's true." Chrom sighs. "Think those kids are alright?"

"They should be." Robin saw Brady supporting Maribelle to a tent. "See?"

Chrom jumped to his feet. "Is she alright?" He asks worriedly.

"I'm fine, Chrom." Maribelle says weakly. "I'm much tougher than you think."

"So she says." Brady grunts. "She'll be fine, so don't worry yer royal head about it."

"Uh…right." Chrom was slightly taken aback by how oddly antagonistic Brady was.

"Don't be rude to Chrom." Maribelle snaps.

Brady shrugs. "Sorry, force of habit." And continues to lead her to a tent.

_He looks like he needs the rest as much as she does. _Chrom notes.

"Is she ok?" Robin asks when he returns.

"Yeah, she's fine." Chrom sighs. "The healer in charge didn't seem to like me very much."

_Brady? _Robin raised an eyebrow. _I wonder why. _"Interesting."

Chrom was not present when Robin was guessing families.

…

Chrom suddenly drew Falchion. Robin drew her steel sword as well.

The two looked around, ignoring the confused glances from the other soldiers. A few of them wizened up and drew their weapons as well.

"That way." Chrom said after a few seconds, and bolted off.

"Wh-wait!" Robin followed after him.

"The hell is he going?" Basilio demands, his axe in hand.

Robin shrugs and doesn't break stride.

"Pah." Basilio follows after the two.

…

…

_What was that odd feeling? _Chrom thought, his Falchion gleaming in the darkness as he followed his gut feeling out of camp. "Come out." He called out to the darkness.

As if obliging him, a Risen clad in tattered robes stumbled into the moonlight, holding something glowing faintly amber in his hand.

_What is that thing? _Chrom wondered. "What are you?" He felt compelled to ask.

The Risen growled in response, the stone in its hand slowly growing in power…and then it lunges forward.

Chrom moves the Falchion to block the Risen's outstretched arm. Chrom was then very surprised as he felt himself pushed back by the force of the blow.

_That wasn't normal. _He follows the gleam of the gem as its holder darts around him. It makes another pass at him.

This time, Chrom side steps the swing and uses his momentum to drive the Falchion into the Risen's flank.

"What?" Chrom takes some fast steps back when the Falchion didn't make much of an indentation.

"Kill…Lord…" The Risen gurgled.

"So you can speak." Chrom calls out. "Can you understand?"

"Kill…Lord…" It repeated before lunging again.

"I suppose not." Chrom charges the Risen in response and swings low, using the force of the Risen's charge to send it off balance. While it was off balance, Chrom twists and stabs the Risen in the back.

_As expected. _He thought as the Falchion only went in a fraction of an inch. "Tough, aren't you?" He backs off to a safer distance.

"Chrom!" Robin arrives on the scene, sees the Risen (who has just turned to face Chrom) and shoots it in the back with a Thoron. The Thoron bounces off (kinda, sorta).

"Be careful. It has some impressive defenses." Chrom says.

"Even against the Falchion?" Basilio mutters as the three of them move to put the Risen in the middle of their triangle.

"So it seems." Chrom nods. "It seems to be here for my head."

_Impossible. _Robin thought in her head. _It's not aggressive enough._ Robin mentally counted to three, and then suddenly jumped to her right while tossing a Thoron behind Chrom, into the undergrowth next to a tall tree.

"Shit!" A voice came from behind Chrom, who moved to put both the voice and the Risen in view. The owner of the voice ran out from the undergrowth and charged at Chrom.

Chrom simply pointed the Falchion in front of the man and he slowed down a fraction. Long enough for Robin to nail him with a wind spell.

"I take it you're behind this?" Chrom asks coldly.

"Heh." The voice snaps his fingers.

The Risen in the middle growls…then the growl changes in tone. The change was enough to alert the three good guys that whatever it was, it was seriously bad news.

The gem it was holding then suddenly stop glowing, and under the moonlight Chrom could make out a pair of wings coming out of the Risen's back.

"Holy…it's a Manakete?" Basilio breathes as he stares at the glowing, now slightly reptilian eye of the Risen. "Impossible!"

"Gotcha." Chrom snaps to attention when he realizes that the Manakete had stolen all of it…and he had lost track of the assassin.

The Assassin then screamed in pain and Chrom saw his body fly past him…with a sword lodged deep into his chest.

"Wow…good shot, Luce." Yarne remarks, coming into the clearing. "Looks like we made it on time."

"Who are you?" Robin asks, trying her level best to ignore the flight signals resounding through her body.

"The name's Yarne, I'm a Taguel." Yarne grins.

"Talk later, subjugation now." Laurent wraps the Risen Manakete with flames, illuminating it for all to see. "My god." He breathes.

The Average Risen physically resembles a living person, with some differences such as eyes and skin color. The Risen Manakete could be best described as a blob that barely resembles anything, much less a person.

_It probably doesn't have the power to maintain any physical shape for long. _Robin hypothesizes. "What can we do to fight it?"

"I got this." Yarne takes out his beast stone and transforms into his demon bunny form.

"What is tonight coming to?" Basilio shakes his head.

Yarne laughs in response and charges full pelt towards the Risen, who roars in reply and countercharges.

"Are…are you alright?" Lucina asks Chrom, not bothering to retrieve the sword lodged in the assassin. It was a cheap bronze one anyway.

"Yes…thanks to your accurate aim." Chrom replies and notes her blue hair. He stares for a second.

"What is it?" Lucina was a little worried that her cover was blown.

"Robin, would you say that Cynthia is related to her?" Chrom asks lightly.

Lucina's heart sank. They were told to avoid blowing their cover unless absolutely necessary.

Robin walked around Lucina once. "I would say that they are related…excuse me." She reaches up to Lucina's face and brushes her hair aside. "Yep. She's your kid."

Lucina buried her face in her hands. "What did Cynthie do?" She asks in despair.

"Oh, nothing important." Chrom reassures her.

"She just casually dropped the most important information we have ever heard in the middle of conversation." Robin adds.

Lucina drops to her knees.

"It…uh…it's ok?" Chrom wasn't sure what to do. "I'm not angry or anything…uh…"

_Must be hard trying to console your daughter who's utterly disappointed in her future sister. _Robin thought idly…before realizing that they still have an undead half dragon to kill. "Can we save it for later?" She jerks a thumb towards the Risen Manakete fighting with Bunny!Yarne.

_Bunny!Yarne has the Manakete pinned to the floor and is punching its face in with amazing speed._

"I don't think he needs our help." Basilio grunts as they watch the Bunny perform an elbow drop on the Risen.

…

…

[1st Person Camera]

…

…

We (us plus Nah) reach the camp some time during the night…I don't really know. We did see Lucina and company there along with Chrom, and she was talking very hurried to Chrom, so assume something important happened.

Nah conked out when she was on Magna's back, so when we landed we just got some covers and let the two of them sleep.

Ultimately, the Risen left this place alone, which was…more than fortunate.

Over the course of the next day we would find out that the Risen army had dissipated and was attacking people at random while we chilled and licked our wounds in this abandoned village.

"That really worries me." Robin said during debrief. "They were obviously being controlled before, so what happened? I'm assuming that their controllers left, so I'm now concerned about where their controllers went."

The worst news is the fact that we definitely did not kill a million Risen. I mean, we killed a _lot _of them, but (according to Noire, who's surprisingly good at keeping track of numbers even while in her caps lock mode) we took down maybe a quarter of that number at best.

Add in our estimates for how many we killed during the skirmishing up to this point and it's fair to say we took down about a third. Probably a little bit less, but a third is a good estimate.

Meaning that there's still more than half a million Risen running wild…MAYBE with someone controlling them, causing mayhem and havoc across the countryside.

Ugh.

I guess this is what it's like when the Risen random spawns pop up every day? We can rush around and kill them for experience but ultimately they're everywhere and neverending.

_That's not the biggest problem._

No. The biggest problem is the fact that Valm started to move.

Cherche showed up about an hour ago (two days after our battles ended), and judging by the bags under her eyes she flew here next to nonstop.

Honestly, at this point I'm not quite sure what Valm is planning at all…plus, Chrom and company has resolved to squash the fuck out of the remainder of the Risen army, so they're not gonna move out to invade Valm.

_Without a Valm invasion actually landing on our shores, I'm pretty sure there's no reason to actually bring the hurt to…uh…what's his face. Walhart._

In any event, we're splitting up. I'm going back home to the coast to cover it against the Valm assault for the foreseeable future, and the Shepherds are weeding the garden.

"So what about us?" Brady asks on behalf of the future children.

I really want to examine their equipment. I'm also really interested in the Risen Manakete they met in the night, but…

"You're free to do as you please, though I'd prefer if you stick with the Shepherds." We reply.

I can do that some other time.

_Robin gave us the shard the Manakete had, though._

…

On preliminary examination (with Nah's help) the shard was indeed a fragment of a Dragonstone.

"Dragonstones will only break if its user dies." Nah had said. "And only then under tremendous stress. I'm not sure how this piece was created, but whatever it was it was not due to that tremendous stress; the break lines are too smooth."

She also assured us that it was literally impossible to destroy a Dragonstone unless you were its original user.

Hrm.

Well, they're all questions for later.

…

If you think about, this was simultaneously the most and least productive…two weeks? So far. We fought an army that didn't matter in a place that had no value. Ferox lost a lot of troops, have a few hundred thousand Risen still running around inside it, and (probably) lost a handful of skilled officers we're gonna need in the future.

In a word, fuck.

_On the plus side, we found the future kids._

We got lucky with finding Cynthia, Noire practically dropped into our laps, and Nah's group found us.

…

_Though Cherche came and fetched us in a hurry, we insisted that she (and Minvera) take a breather before we head back._

I'm not as worried with the situation along the coast, since my town has the best defenses in the history of mankind and Morgan's got a good head on his shoulders.

So let's take this moment and tally up what we learned.

_We know there's an entity capable of mustering a massive Risen army._

We already know that Validar is capable of controlling Risen...if he's the only one capable, I have no idea. Regardless, whether if they can create these extremely aggressive but otherwise flimsy Risen is up for debate, but we should assume that someone's hell bent on fucking all of us over.

Question is…is there a correlation between this Risen showing up and Valm invading? If memory serves, Plegia lent ships and ONLY ships for the good guys for the Valm invasion because they wanted to preserve their firepower for the eventual summoning of the murder dragon.

_For us, Plegia is on the road to recovery but it's probably not going to be in any shape to lend any kind of support, be it ships or manpower._

In that case…there is the possibility that the Grimleal summoned that army to shank us in the back.

_But if they had the skill and expertise to summon an army that size…_

…Then they wouldn't be in the shitty situation they're in to begin with. Last I heard the Grimleal were barely consolidating their political power as it is.

Speaking about the Grimleal, I haven't heard anything about Hawk lately. I wonder if he's ok.

_The dude tried to kill us._

But Kite is so cute though.

_That's not a valid excuse._

Fiiine.

…

Next point: The Risen have evolved new skills. This could be a one-time event, or all future Revenants could have that obscene damage output. They're easy to kill, sure, but this event shows that they can be massed to large numbers.

_Imagine if whoever massed them simply separated them out to 100 squads of 10000._

Ferox would be dead in the water then. Hell, our entire continent would be dead in the water then.

Gah.

Ok.

For the moment, assume that these Risen can certainly appear in the future and at large numbers. I need a countermeasure. The bombs work, but if push comes to shove it's entirely possible that we will not be able to secure an airfield or a reasonable location to load the munitions and stay safe at the same time.

_Expand the Halloween girls project?_

Not feasible: takes too long. The Halloween girls are a team of four girls (two riders, two gunners) and they train constantly to fly and aim at the same time.

Hmm…

Lastly, based on the testimony of the future kids…and honestly this is a little bit "after the fact", but we know that the future children's weapons are designed specifically and only for the sake of killing Risen. I mean…if we're gonna kill normal people, the Fanelia can be used for its brute force, but using a squad of guys with railguns is more efficient.

They don't really know how the weapons are powered. I have some guesses, but until I get to pop one open and check it out I can't be sure.

Also, Cynthia has elected to go with us after she gets her legs mended. Maribelle is sure she could do it, but she would like to consult with Emmeryn (who was apparently the best healer in Ylisse) before doing the operation.

_Severa was torn between being happy and being annoyed._

Also also, Nah's coming along too. I don't really know why. She doesn't really know why. "I feel like I should…please and thank you." Was her answer.

Well, I like Nah, so it works out. At least she'll be less hyperactively energetic than Nowi.

_She's Nowi's kid._

Oh right.

…

Shit.

…

…

_So what's next for us?_

Well…Chrom's going to rouse the Shepherds and they're going to go on crackdown against the Risen threat. The remnants of the Risen army apparently burned a lot of land (again, how are they getting that fire?) and Ferox is economically on the back foot as a result. Moreover, a lot of well-trained soldiers were lost…are being lost…and it doesn't look good for them.

Jury's out on how well Ylisse is faring. Chrom's worried, too.

Our job then is to keep the coastline locked down tight. If Valm wants to invade, fine. We'll make them swim the entire way.

_Do you think it'll play out like it does in the game?_

Where we blitz the fuck outta him? Not likely.

Valm has to be hurting financially. We might actually have a chance at persuading Walhart to bury the axe here…I mean, Grima's the big threat.

Hmm.

.

.

.

{ === + === }

Author Notes:

So I wanted to do a big close out for the interludes and it went kinda huge.

But at this point the interludes are donesies, and the next chapter will be a short preparation for the ocean roflstomp.

(There might be more errors here since it's bigger than normal)

((We crashed the doc uploader when we tried copy/pasting all of it))

(((Thanks to TheGiantRock for pointing out mistakes~)))


	28. Valm Campaign - 1

{ === + === }

"Ok, try it now."

Nah nods in response. "Ok…taking off."

The X on her back glows and she zooms into the air.

I've had two months to look at the power source of that thing and I STILL don't know how it works. I know what it is though.

_What is it?_

The equipment of the Future Kids are all powered via Dragonstone fragments. The fact that all of them emit the same colored particles implies that future me is using fragments from a singular Dragonstone.

_Assuming that pieces of the same Dragonstone emit the same colored particles to begin with. Tautology at its finest._

I would like to think that Future!Me used the Dragonstone of someone we know (if only because it would be narratively fitting), but since we saw that at least one Risen Manakete exists, it's a pretty reasonable assumption to say that Future!Ash nabbed one off of another victim somehow. I mean, we got some fragments off of the one we killed, so…

_But they're near impossible to break._

Right. Nah doesn't know where their fragments came from either, only that they received the gear from Future!Ash about a year before he died.

Either way, though we were unable to reverse-engineer the power structure of Nah's rifle or find any way to alter it, we did upgrade its loader and munition components instead…and as it turns out, Future!Ash apparently did not get help from Morgan and Nino for research, because his rifle has a lot of (comparatively) more primitive parts to it.

Anyways, we modded her rifle's supportive capabilities, and that's what we're here to test.

_Nah flies in the sky towards the bundle of straw we're using as the target. She slows down and levels her gun at it and fires off a semi-rapid, five round burst of orange energy. They strike the straw and don't really do anything important._

Not that I expected it to.

Minor Tangent: Due to the efforts of ourselves and Nino, we were able to complete what I'd like to think is the number one most important technological advancement with sound.

I'm talking, of course, about the radio.

…Although for us it's more of a walkie-talkie that had kids with wireless internet.

_We break down sound into a magical series of zeros and ones, shoot it in all directions (with a packet header for the magical data so the correct nodes (read: ours) can receive them) and then reform it into sound. The effective range of our magical headphones is about 500 meters tops, but it goes down if there is magical interference of any kind._

Like, say, a battlefield of some kind. The Blackbird girls, per their status as battlefield recon, have stronger variants that have a 2 kilometer broadcasting range.

But yeah, this is what I paid out of my nose for…worth every penny and then some.

Tangent over. Just know that both Nah and I are wearing these headsets.

"Boss." I hear Nah's voice in my ear. "The rifle seems to be working as expected."

"Understood, start testing it in tandem with the verniers."

"Ok."

_Nah begins flying in erratic patterns with the X-wing while pumping the bale of hay with bullets._

So, upgrades.

Nah's weapon has been modified to fire pebbles, instead of nails. That way she has practically unlimited ammo no matter where she goes. It also fires a small discharge from the Dragonstone with each shot, giving each pebble a streaky, orangely appearance.

_We've also replaced the older rails in her gun with fresh ones; her old ones were exhausted._

The upside: her weapon is now a semi-automatic beam rifle, and we're making pew pew noises in our head every time she fires (namely, the beam rifle noise from Gundam 00). It's also immediately and utterly fatal to all but the most resilient Risen targets.

The downside: the penetrating power of the weapon drops against flesh and blood targets and armor, so it isn't as useful against armored enemies of either Risen or human origins (against something like a General the gun's actually utterly useless). We've also confiscated the Fanelia options and are researching a different way of using them.

_Preliminary research indicates that the Fanelia Beam is literally raw Manakete power fired as a beam weapon. It is impressive, but inefficient. It is the same as throwing brass and primer at the enemy instead of turning it into a bullet._

Anyways…

Her Verniers are just us expanding the exhausts on her wings to give her a little more kick. It increases her flight ceiling but seems to be a lot more unstable in how well it can keep her afloat as a tradeoff.

Nah is without a shadow of a doubt the cornerstone of the anti-Risen operations with the equipment that she has. We'll be doing our best to ensure that she gets the support she needs, but…

We're a touch out of time. New Years is right around the corner and the letters I've received from Robin implies that Ferox and Ylisse have agreed on a joint operation to strike and take Valm down before spring.

_How are we on the coastal defense?_

The attack that drew us back to the town was the only one that could be considered active. It consisted of nine ships (mostly scouts and light transports) and (according to the Blackhawks) around a hundred men total.

According to Morgan: after the first salvo from the coastal guns two of the ships were instantly sunk (one directly hit, one listed too much due to impacts and sank) and the rest immediately gave up and ran away. So after that first attack the rest of the ships stayed out of our gun range, opting to scout and harass instead of going in for an attack.

Though it's largely due to the admiral being overly careful this time, no Valmese ship has landed on our shores. However, the fact that we only have four ships is starting to strain the defensive efforts as they continuously poke at the coastline. If we don't do something soon they will find an invasion point and we will fail to stop all of them...at sea.

_Spoiler alert: the enemy ships are not actually out of our gun range._

We have a grand total of eight combat-capable ships as of right now:

The Carrier Enterprise, which is our flagship and still sitting in the docks because the air force is still based on the ground.

The Frigates Hammerhead, Great White, and Orca. The Frigates are lighter and faster than the Destroyers, but they don't carry as many guns as a tradeoff. They act…WILL act, as escort ships for the Enterprise (and transports) when we set off.

_We got our Frigates by retrofitting old, unused Plegian assault ships (ships designed to ram and board the opposition) with engines, armor, and Gun. Trade off: The Frigates can kill shit at distance but if something gets close the Frigs will probably sink…their hull strength isn't too high when the guns start shooting. They are armored against ballistae shots though._

Lastly, the Destroyers Akatsuki, Hibiki, Ikatsuchi, and Inazuma. They are the bread and butter of our fleet, and given their range, speed, and firepower…well, sucks to be a Valmese ship in our waters.

…

…

_On the topic of the kids: given that we're considering Nah the focal firepower, what else does she and the other future kids get?_

Nah has her rifle, her X-Wings, some new armor skirt (very thin, but should cover her against the errant arrow strike), the cylinder on her left arm (which she demoed for us and it was awesome), and the claws on her waist which I don't see the use of.

_"Yeah, there's no favoritism here." Cynthia had huffed when Nah equipped out her entire loadout. "She looks like a teeny tiny war goddess."_

True. The armored skirt makes Nah look like…a metal variant of the Bride class.

Speaking of Cynthia…

She has the Cruise Engines and Combat Rigging, plus her overpowered torch staff. In terms of specialized loadout…I don't really know. Honestly, Cynthia is hard to equip for because she's so much more erratic than everybody else, but she's a very good flier so we've given her the equipment usually reserved for the Halloween girl pairs.

_So she by herself can act as an AC-130._

She made adjustments to her bracing so her gear won't come loose even if she does any high mobility maneuvers, so she's literally a flying, dogfighting gunship…if she's paying attention instead of grandstanding.

_Cynthia's Grandstanding might as well be a skill. Square her damage output if she's paying attention, square root it if she isn't._

Cynthia's legs are now fine, by the way.

Uh…next.

Severa has the basic gear of a Mercenary plus her four Levin Bits. The Bits operate with a combination of wind and lightning magic (she keeps them hovering around her with wind and fires them out with lightning). Due to the fact that it takes a lot of magic to recover the Bits from their attack, she chose to have only four of them and very rarely sends them out to attack on their lonesome. Instead, she uses them to assist her own combat efforts and they can strike like the fury of a god(dess) from very awkward angles and very erratic attack times…basically, if Nah is the ultimate at dealing area of effect damage, Severa is the ultimate at dealing focused point damage.

_She demonstrated what she could do with the Levin bits against some of the soldiers we trained up as our land force. Severa could dominate the battle against the individual soldiers especially at close range. The soldiers described the area around her as the "absolute territory which we could never enter", and then became a little confused when we grinned and looked away._

Of course, the Levin Bits have a combination attack where they act as prisms for Nah's Fanelia option. Since that Option is off the table is the bits don't need the combo attack any more.

We've given her a rifle and a two-handed Chainsword to complement her otherwise normal sword, because obviously the Ultimate Grade-S Tsundere Duelist was not dangerous enough. We're also working on getting her the X-wings for Nah, but obviously not knowing how the power source works is hampering that effort.

_She's using what I'm now referring to as the Y-wings, which we ourselves used during the Plegian war (and is thinking of using again). Or T-wings…the wing position is somewhere in the middle._

Uh…the other kids…

Lucina has electrified bracers that let her toss swords faster. The same bracers can also give off a very small and powerful blast of electrical magic power at point blank range, effectively giving her a Taser option when she needs to disable rather than kill outright.

_We've seen her beat someone down with the flat of her Falchion's blade, though, so I don't see how the blast helps her any._

Gerome has a scythe. We've prepared combat rigging and engines for his Minerva when he shows up. I don't know what's special about the scythe though, apart from the fact that it makes him the reaper of the skies and is stupid long. Maybe it's extra sharp or something.

Noire has a set of emitters that can be added onto any bow she wields. It gives her arrows more kick and soaks them in the power of the Dragonstones, so she can drop any Risen with a single hit. This is probably the most interesting gear for us (developmentally speaking) since the equipment of everybody else has an integrated power source.

Brady got nothing…he does have a set of armor underneath his robes that are practically weightless due to the spell circles inscribed on them, but offensively he didn't get anything. We gave him a rifle.

_"I'd rather not use it, but I see your intent." Brady had said. "Thanks, boss."_

Laurent has a set of spellbooks from future me. Apparently they're all designed to give his targets the biggest middle finger the world has ever seen.

_"I think one of his spells does exactly that." Cynthia had commented when we made the middle finger remark._

Yarne has a set of brass knuckles (kinda). They use some interesting technology that I'm amazed future me only gave to him, but in general it makes Yarne the gatecrasher of the team. The tech is…it reminds me of the cartridge system from Lyrical Nanoha. That's about all I know of it. If I can figure out how to reproduce it then we'll have an interesting thing to work with.

_In retrospect, the Fanelia option probably uses a similar technology, since it lets Nah overcharge her power before releasing it._

Probably.

Who's left?

Kjelle…she didn't seem to have anything. At least, not according to Cynthia.

_Cynthia says: "Kjelle was always a bit of a stickler for the rules; she would rather win based on personal strength than superior equipment."_

Owain, Inigo. Haven't met them yet, so there's not much to talk about, but Severa did hint that Owain had a system similar to hers.

Severa had also said that not all of their gear made it to the past, and not all of the gear that made it survived the engagements they had until we met them, so that's a consideration I'll have to take into account.

_It's entirely possible that Nah is overpowered as hell because she takes the best care of her gear._

I imagine being naturally strong helps in that regard…or maybe we just like how adorable she is.

…

…

A week before New Years Day, the Shepherds arrived…plus a hand-picked army from Ylisse and Ferox.

_The Ylissean force is primarily Cavaliers, Armored Knights, Great Knights. The Feroxi force is Fighter, Mercenary, Hero._

"No Paladins?" I asked Robin when I saw the somewhat ramshackle Ylissean army.

"We needed the faster troops to handle Risen." Robin had explained. "So we're improvising."

…

I feel like if the army being used to invade is built on the idea of improvisation, then something is going to go wrong.

"Yeah…well…at least they're all top of the line soldiers." Was Robin's final, offhand, assessment.

We'll…uh, take her word for it? We're responsible for the organizing the logistics train of the army, and for footing its bill some. Like…I'm rich, but I'm not "buy an entire army" rich.

_We have eight ships, 60 fliers, 200 infantry, and probably a few thousand levies and volunteers if we send out a general muster._

Warm bodies aren't automatically an army.

_It would take us around 500 grand to outfit the levies with bronze spears and leather armor, and an extra 200 grand for every last one of them to have a magic-independent crossbow designed to be used by people who have never seen one before. And an extra 100 grand for all of them to have enough ammo to kill about fifty people each._

…Oh.

Then I guess we do have enough money on hand to just raise an army.

But that's beside the point.

_What is the point?_

The point is I don't feel like paying for the entire operation.

_What is the operation?_

…

…

"As…you can guess." Robin says a little defeatedly when we walk into the command room (one of the meeting rooms in my mansion) and see Emmeryn. "We're going to be fighting a fast paced pinpoint strike of a war."

Why's Emmeryn here?

_We glance at Emmeryn. She smiles serenely back at us. We fear the worst._

"As you may be aware, Ash," Basilio gestures to four markers denoting the positions of enemy fleets either docked on the islands or anchored offshore on the map-table. "The Valmese fleet is separated and waiting."

_With regards to the map, if our town is the same spot as the chapter 12 marker in the game, then the four Valm fleet markers are scattered with two at the sea battle marker, one north (between the sea battle and Morgan) and one south (between the sea battle and Cynthia's marker)._

"Yeah, we hit them pretty hard." I nod. "They're so far away from our coasts because we scared them off."

"Really?" Robin frowns. I believe she thinks we're overconfident.

_We've been talking a lot of trash…I don't blame her._

"I had some of the coastal guns go full power and fire a few rounds; as far as the Valmese fleet is concerned we can hit them even if they were docked on the Valm coastline." We try to feign nonchalance.

_We're obviously exaggerating here._

"Well, be that as it may…" Robin says. "The fact remains that the Valmese fleet is split into four. It is thus reasonable to believe that if they were to conduct four separate strikes independently of each other on different locations in the coastline, even you would be hard pressed to stop them." She looks to me.

We nod in reply.

Robin continues. "In that event, our preliminary strike will be as thus…yes?"

Basilio had held up a hand.

"My spies have given us a number…they have to have roughly 300 ships in those four fleets combined."

Robin whistles. "Composition?"

"Mostly warships given transport duty." Basilio grunts. "I don't know what kind of miracle you can do, Ash, but we're on the back foot in terms of numbers here."

"It's just three hundred ships." I frown. "We can sink them all in, like, two hours. Tops." We've been over this.

Silence.

"Surely you jest." Fredrick scowls.

_Firepower must be seen to be believed._

Well, we have the Torpedoes, ship-mounted anti-ship guns, Halloween anti-ship guns, bunker busters, anti-ship cluster bombs (these are new)…really the only thing we're missing is the anti-ship missile.

"I have the gear and I have the people." I stare at Fredrick. "Like…when push comes to shove the Valmese fleet is just going to go belly up and die. The fact that they split their forces to make sure that I don't sink all of them in one go works against them, too."

"If Ash says he can do it, then he can do it." Basilio says after another minute of silence.

"If Basilio has such confidence, who are we to question him?" Chrom jumps in, clearly interested in moving on with the discussion.

"Right, right…we'll leave the ocean battle to you, then." Robin mutters. "In that case, let's talk about our path of operation on land."

…

…

[Talky talky blah blah blah]

…

…

After careful deliberation, the plan goes as thus:

We will strike and kill the Valmese fleet in order of their closeness to our coastline. With any luck, they'll get spooked and bunch up for safety, in which case we'll Pearl Harbor their asses and call it a day.

Then, we beeline towards the Valmese coast towards the largest coastal town within reach. With any luck, it's going to be the theatre for chapter 15, so we'll nab Say'ri while we're at it. I'm a little worried about this part since its occurrence in the game could be chalked up to a happy accident.

_Odds of Say'ri being captured before we can get to her: high. Odds of her dancing to Yen'Fay's tune without her knowledge: impressively high. Like he could just place her under house arrest or something and we'll be screwed out of a somewhat non-vital character._

Robin believes—rightfully, I might add—that the Valmese garrison will be undermanned if we blow past the enemy navy fast enough, so she's planning the lightning fast offensive against said garrison so we can take and hold the town as a supply point for further exertions inland.

_Our personal infantry will be participating in that one._

_Then_, we'll strike at Valmese key points en route to their capital, where we will meet Walhart in battle, beat his ass, and then Emmeryn will talk his ears off.

Or something like that.

_Emmeryn's plan is to rally the Valmese people and dampen the flames of war, so we can talk Walhart down. She doesn't believe that he's being a conqueror for the sake of being a conqueror, so…yeah. She's right in that regard, mind you, but we do believe that her actions are extremely risky for a head of state._

Robin, Chrom, pretty much everyone else agrees. Best case scenario, we talk Walhart down and get Valm as an ally for the fight against Grima.

Worst case scenario…we lose Valm as a continent to the power vacuum that occurs if we have to kill Walhart, it then spirals out of control just like Plegia, and then the Risen finishes everything off.

Depending on how Walhart maintains loyalty in his subjects, this…well, no point worrying about it now.

I need to get our shit together.

_We will be taking care of the fighting._

_Mustafa will be taking care of the transports._

The Shepherds will also be stationed aboard the Enterprise in case of emergencies, as it is the most heavily defended ship in the fleet.

…

_So, about the bomb and your infantry…_

The anti-ship bomb takes the Bunker buster (sets shit on fire plus drill head), reduces its size, packs it into a shell, and then wraps the entire thing in the same spell setting used by Severa's Levin Bits.

_Severa had instructions for maintaining her Levin bits. We reverse engineered that a little bit._

In other words, when the bomb goes off in the air it fires the small incendiary drill warhead at speeds fast enough to penetrate a ship's deck with ease. And then the inside of said ship catches on fire (on multiple levels) because the bomb leaks oil. We don't have a lot of them since the tech is recent, but given what I've seen of Valmese shipbuilding technology (as in, fire sucks on wooden ships), a single hit on the enemy flag ships will result in a total kill of that ship.

Our Infantry are…very reminiscent of a Roman Legionary, with some modifications.

Their square shields have a three layer thick set of small, wooden squares in the center. These squares have spell paper inside it and are doused with spirit dust before being launched into the air. Their purpose: to detonate in the air against any oncoming spells. Effective range is about ten meters.

Their armor is pretty light (leather with some crucial places protected by plate), and would classify these troops as light, skirmishing infantry.

_Going by raw stats they would have values somewhere between a Mercenary and Armor Knight. Tough enough to take a few hits but still pretty reliant on evasion to survive._

Their weapons are: sword, javelins, and a crossbow. The crossbow is their "fuck you armor" weapon. All of their weapons are entirely non-magic based, and the crossbow carries a self-kill trigger that the soldiers are encouraged to pull if they are ever down with no hope of rescue, to ensure that crossbow tech never leaves our lands faster than it absolutely has to.

The soldiers operate in groups of five, and for this operation we have ten groups, headed by Captain Stephan, who we recruited within the past two months. Severa acts as a Lieutenant within the group and heads her own squad.

_"About time I got my own command." She had puffed her chest out proudly, much to Cynthia's jealousy._

Again, Cynthia's erratic, so she's not a good choice as a captain.

We also have supporting mages and healers, but strictly speaking they don't count as the main fighting force. Nino and Morgan co-head both groups, with Morgan more on the healing side and Nino more on the shooting side.

The air force is led by Cherche, who Virion gladly loaned us for the entirety of the operation. One of the Rafale girls (Don't remember her name…Rafale One) is the lieutenant for the air force if Cherche is unable to command.

Also, and I feel like this is the most important detail.

_We're lying._

Everyone serving in the active military group has adorable (and in the case of men: badass) small over-one-shoulder capes.

…

[The day of departure]

…

_The entire departing force (tallying up to roughly 1500 units) is arranged on the dock, waiting for final muster and boarding of the transports. This is more a formality than anything else though._

"Wow, so this is your entire assembled force?" Robin asks when she sees my troops orderly assembled on the dock. "It's smaller than I thought." She winks at me.

"We have more than enough here." I laugh. "All of them are professionals, no need to worry."

_She might be referring to the physical size of the girls: all of them lean towards being a tad mousey._

"They even have matching uniforms!" Lissa complains(?). "Chrom, you should have something like that for the Shepherds."

"We don't have that kind of money." Chrom chuckles. "Perhaps we can borrow some?"

_Some of the troops from the other nations are glaring at my units with barely disguised disgust and envy. The more veteran of them don't seem to care though._

"Sure, when we come back from this war." I look around. "So who's kicking this thing off?"

"That would be his highness." Fredrick indicates to Chrom. I thought it would be Emmeryn?

"As a diplomat, Emmeryn would do us no favors by speaking out in front of soldiers." Robin explains when she catches my confusion. "So Chrom would be the natural better choice."

"Even against Basilio?" I wonder.

"I'm only good when speaking in a fight." Basilio laughs.

…

…

[One somewhat stilted speech later]

We board the ships and set off.

…

…

"I love this ship. It's so smooth." Robin says happily. "I was worried about being seasick, but this is great!"

Oh, it gets worse when we really get moving.

_We've spent quite a lot of time in the past two months doing drills aboard the carrier._

"I can see by your smirk you disagree." Robin sighs. "Well…whatever. Are you ready?"

"We have the gear and we have the scouts." I jerk my head to the catapults. "We're gonna be ready real soon."

We watch the two teams of Blackbirds get catapulted into the sky.

_Our catapults are now more like electrified sliders that the rider and mounts sit precariously on._

Our overreliance on magical equipment actually bit us in the ass here: the catapults can't be too high or they'll interact with the cruise engines and explode, and any other setup wouldn't give the power needed to actually propel the loaded down Pegasus Knights into the air.

"Blackbirds, do you copy?" I say into my microphone.

_Robin looks at us weirdly; we haven't introduced her to the radio yet._

"I hear ya, boss. What do you need?"

"Keep your eyes open and don't stray too far from the ships. I can't imagine them being close enough to hit right now."

"Got it." _"Leave it to us!" Other team goes._

"What did you just do? Who were you talking to?" Robin demands.

"Well, it's this little thing…"

…

…

[Valm Fleet, 0930 Hours, Next Day]

…

…

_In the admiral's quarters._

"Sir, a fleet has set off from the enemy's main coastal city." A messenger reports. "They are on course for the point of engagement."

"They're really just going to walk into our trap, huh?" The admiral's aide smirks. "As expected…the admiral's plans are foolproof."

"How many ships are in the enemy fleet?" The Admiral, Ignatius (boss of chapter 14) asks calmly.

_He's a big, burly linebacker of a man who wears the heaviest armor possible while on the ocean._

"The watchers say…around thirty ships, only four of which are obvious warships." The aide replies.

"We have three hundred ships!" The aide practically yelled. "What is he playing at?!"

"He's either very brave or very stupid." Ignatius sneers. _But given his reputation and our past experience it's safe to assume that he has something up his sleeve. _He reminds himself. "Alert all ships and move into combat positions. We will strike the enemy down with all of our might."

"That seems a little excessive." His strategist notes as the aide bows and leaves. "And a little too cautious of you, my lord. Is everything alright?"

"I've heard from the survivors of Dalton's detachment." Ignatius says. "I have half a mind to discard the ravings of lunatics, but their fear is real."

"Of a few ships? Fear?" The aide smirks. "Dalton was a fool…no more, no less."

Ignatius chuckles. "That may be, but in the end his fleet, known for their ability and perseverance in landing strikes, was lost at sea before setting their foot on the ground." He scowls. "Even if we consider the stories of the sailors to be drunken banter, the fact remains that something was capable of stopping the invasion before it even started."

The Strategist nods. "And that something is their coastal defenses. The amount of force required to fire a ballista bolt at the distances the sailors implied would make them impossible to carry on a ship." He pauses. "Unless you believe he can bring them to bear on his ships?"

The aide frowns. "Knowing of the reputation of our enemy, he might very well have."

"If his reputation is even half true then this is not a battle we will survive without losing a few ships." Ignatius rises to his feet. "Aide, send message to the secondary fleet. Tell them to move their ramming ships forward at all haste."

"I wish you'd learn my name after a year of service, sir." The aide grins and gets a good natured bop on the head from Ignatius. "Ignatius's Aide will do as he asks."

"Were we at peace, I'd love to see what he has done to his fleet of ships." Ignatius adds as an afterthought. "Ships without sails, guns powerful enough to strike at what you can't even see, and a large transport to act as the flagship…his method of fighting must be truly enlightening to learn from."

"But we are at war." The strategist sighs.

"That I know…and it's truly unfortunate."

…

[Next Day, 1500 Hours]

…

Ash stared at the image taken by the Blackbird scouts along with the rest of the Shepherds who elected to attend the meeting (so pretty much all of them).

"Wow." Chrom was the first to comment. "That's a lot of boats."

The image clearly showed a veritable wall of sails arranged in a concave ahead of them.

_Lissa bounced out of the room to check if they were close enough to see said wall of sails. They were not._

"I imagined 300 boats being a lot less dangerous-looking in my head." Cynthia mumbled. "Are we going to be ok?"

_This pretty much screams trap. A concave like this would kill us. _Ash thought idly. "Yeah, we're fine." He taps on his earpiece. "This is Enterprise to all available air units, assemble in the briefing room. We'll go over our combat plans now."

"Now this I have to see." Fredrick says with an expectant grin. "I look forward to seeing what kind of plan you will cook up to stop all of us from dying."

"You sound way too damn happy about that, Sir Fredrick." Brady huffs, and gets a bop on his head from Maribelle.

"Some people just wanna watch the ships burn." Cynthia said with the tone of saying something deep and intelligent.

"Enough." Ash snaps his fingers. "Briefing room. Now."

"What? Why me?" Cynthia complains with no real malice in her voice.

"Because you have wings, now hurry up."

…

…

_Within the large Briefing room (row and rows of chairs arranged in front of a platform and a screen)…_

"This is the first time I've seen a command room such as this." Fredrick mutters. "Where do you plan to put the map?"

"Look at all those girls." Virion whistles as the Shepherds pick out seats in the back. "I think I see his tastes."

A few of the girls sitting in the front (all participants in the operation) give Virion a deathglare before Ash clears his throat and reorients their attention towards the screen.

"Now then, this is what we're facing." Ash put the images of the enemy on a podium set at one of the edges of the screen and they are reproduced on the larger screen after a moment of shimmering and Ash concentrating.

"Wow…" Lissa stares at the large image with her mouth half open.

"This is nothing short of incredible, just how did he do this…?" Miriel wonders.

"Ask Morgan. He figured it out." Ash says quickly. "Anyways, on task. Is everyone here?" He looks around and sees his girls sitting, watching the screen intently. "Good."

He pulls out a stick (it really is just a tree branch) and taps the large cloth screen behind him. "As you can see, the entirety of the enemy fleet is arranged in a large concave, waiting to receive us on the open waters." He then draws a circle around the entirety of the enemy fleet. "It is thus imperative that we strike and sink the enemy here and break through to the enemy shores."

He looks around and sees nods all around. "Good. Our fleet will be gathered here." He taps the dead center of the concave. "Naturally, we won't be close enough for the enemy to hit us, but due to the difference in maneuverability between our transports, our combat ships, and the enemy fleet our warships will be unable to move once combat starts, due to their need of protecting our transports."

He then taps the left and right flanks of the enemy warships. "As such, while our destroyers are bombarding the enemy ships—"

_"That's such a good name for a ship. Destroyer." Cynthia sighs with satisfaction._

"—our air units will strike from one of these two flanks with a concerted torpedo attack." Ash draws a small circle around each of the flanks. "Of course, there's no reason to believe that the enemy will maintain their positions once the combat starts, so once you get into the air wait for my signal before unleashing your missiles."

"All of them?" Cynthia raised an eyebrow.

Ash nods. "Yeah. You are to rearm afterwards. This is going to be a long operation, so don't stay out too long."

"Sure thing, boss." Rafale One grins. "We'll be back before dark like good little girls."

_A few chuckles here and there._

Ash smiles slightly. "Given the nature of the operation, all Pegasus Knight squadrons will be flying anti-ship operations, while all Wyvern Knights will fly top cover. The Halloween squadron will protect the fleet and snipe any targets that close in on the warships. Halloween, you are hereby cleared to use the Poseidon Anti-Ship cannons."

"And we won't need to carry any anti-personnel equipment, right?" Halloween Two asks. Ash nods in reply. "Ok, good."

"Poseidon?" Robin notes. "That's a weird name."

"It's our Thor anti-ground cannon, but reworked for stability and bracing." Halloween One explains to no benefit of Robin. "I think it sounds cool, actually."

"Sure you do." Robin mutters. Fortunately the girl didn't hear.

"All units." Ash says with just a tiny bit of irritation. "This is going to be our first major operation; remember your training, and trust in your fellow knights…we're going to sink every last one of their ships. Dismissed."

…

Ignatius peered through his spyglass at the oncoming handful of ships. "How many do think we'll lose in this engagement?" He asks his staff idly.

"We'll win this one, hands down, no sweat." His aide proclaims confidently.

"Conservatively? Twenty ships, maybe twenty five." His strategist says (more) realistically. "Even myths are rooted in some reality."

"Indeed." Ignatius agrees, and then takes a deep breath. "Assault ships! Forward!"

…

"Ooh…looks like they're not waiting for us." Ash murmurs, also peering through a spyglass. "Blackbirds, report enemy movement."

"Four enemy ships are at full mage sails and are headed for the fleet." One of the Blackbirds responded. "Given their size and relative speed, they are most likely Valmese assault ships."

_Full mage sail = full sail via wind magic._

_Not surprising, I suppose. _Ash thought idly. "Then let's respond in kind. Akatsuki, you are hereby cleared for long range fire. Blackbirds, coordinate. Let's do this right."

"It's finally our turn, eh?" The Akatsuki's captain (a rugged bear of a sailor) grunts. "Guns! Don't slack off now!"

The hefty front turret with its thin, reinforced rail barrels swiveled and aimed towards the line of specks on the horizon. "Blackbirds, this is Akatsuki Turret. We're reading targets at 35 North North West, distance, 3000 meters. Confirm?"

"This is Blackbird One. We estimate the targets to be at 36 NNW, distance is acceptable."

_Ash really wished he invented targeting computers._

"Akatsuki turret, roger. Adjusting." The sailors in charge of rotating the gun adjusted it slightly. "Ok, sight?"

"I see them…" The Sniper in charge of the aiming muttered. "We have a good read."

"Ok…" the Mage in charge of pressing the button took a deep breath. "Clear the exhausts." He waited until the sailors did as he said. "Firing."

…

Ignatius was looking toward the sky, debating on whether if he should send up his own Pegasus Knights to combat the two little specks flying somewhere between his fleet and his enemy's.

His thought process was then rudely interrupted by loud series of cracks that drew his eyes back down to the assault ships.

"Dear Naga. What was that?" His strategist breathed.

The first assault ship was now mastless…and very obviously missing a large section of its hull.

…

"Blackbird here: good shot, Akatsuki." Blackbird One reported. "Enemy assault ship is listing and taking water."

"Blackbird two here: I have numbers for you, Akatsuki Turret."

"Hey! No fair! Let us get some too!" A different voice complained.

"You'll get more than enough later, now shush." Ash rebuked.

"Akatsuki Turret, roger: give us your marks, Blackbird two."

…

Ignatius watched in wide-eyed shock as the three remaining assault ships barely made it more than hundred meters (one football field plus end zones) before they too were struck and sunk. He shook his head to get the image of the last ship out of his eyes.

_The ship was struck on the bridge section on the rear section of the ship. The impact force tore the wooden structure along with the entire rear section of the ship clean from the rest of its hull. The ship bobbed in the ocean for a second before sinking into the deeps, broken-rear-first._

"Fucking hell, Dalton's men lied to us." The aide slammed his fist onto the ship's railing. "Admiral, what do we—"

"All ships advance." Ignatius commanded. "We cannot win with our usual tactics. Alert all commanders, surround and destroy the enemy ships! Full speed ahead!"

…

"Wow, they're really coming now." Ash murmured. "Look at all those sails."

From the sky, it looked like a half-circle of white was slowly closing in on the small, almost invisible Good Guys™ fleet.

"Your orders, captain?" Rafale One asked.

"We continue the show. What else?" Ash responds. "All Pegasus Knights prepare to deploy torpedo net."

The Pegasus Knights obligingly dive down to the ocean surface, and then drop their torpedoes at a pace comparable to clapping along to a slow song.

"All torpedoes away." Rafale One reports as they watch the blanket of white streaks crawl toward where the enemy ships will be.

Ash nods in approval. "Good…now go back and re-arm; it looks like we have company already." A few heads turned to see the incoming squads of Pegasus Knights. "All Wyverns pull up and engage enemy air elements. You all have clearance to fire…try not to hit the good guys, you hear?"

Ash then takes a deep breath as all twenty of them activate their cruise engines and climb to meet the Pegasus Knights with alarming speed. "Phoenix Company, engage!"

.

.

.

{ === + === }

Author Notes:

Whew. We're onto the Valm campaign in earnest now.

Also: callsigns are so much easier to use than having to think up forty names.


	29. Valm Campaign - 2

{ === + === }

The Valmese Pegasus Knights (a squad of about 30) saw the Allied Wyvern Knights charge at them from the ocean surface.

_What were they doing so close to the water?_ The Pegasus Knight leader wondered as she gave the signal to intercept. _I can ask their leader later after I'm done throwing him off his ride, I suppose. _She had a confident smirk as she dove towards the lead unit of the Wyvern Knights.

The two waves clash.

…

[1st Person Camera]

…

OK wow she's actually really good.

_The enemy Pegasus Knight almost took our head off with a lance thrust._

We dodged it. Because we dodged it we couldn't counter though.

…

[3rd Person Camera]

…

After the exchange, the two groups effectively swapped sides in the air with no real losses incurred.

The Pegasus Knights then proceeded to ignore the Wyvern Riders still ascending after their bout and head towards the Allied warships.

_Wyvern Knights are fast, especially when diving. _The Valmese Knight thought. _So chasing after them is an exercise in futility._

_Thus. _She signals to her flight and they all pull out their javelins. "We'll be striking the enemy ships!" She yells against the wind. "Ready yourselves!"

She hears her flight roars back their acknowledgement.

Suddenly (and much, much too quickly) she hears the screams of Wyverns above their heads.

_Fast! Too fast! _The Valmese knight signaled for her flight to reform and intercept. _How are they so fast?!_

It didn't go too well. Wyvern Knights are already good in a dive, but add in their extra speed due to the Cruise Engines and suddenly they can go from 'setting up to a dive' to 'in your face' in a span of seconds.

The Allied Wyvern Riders slammed into the Pegasus Knights and unseated or outright killed half of the Pegasus squad.

Ash, in particular, caught the enemy squadron Lieutenant with his Poleaxe on the dive and cut through both the poor girl and her mount in one stroke.

_He also almost slammed into the ocean surface because his dive was too fast and deep, but who's counting?_

The Valmese leader, incensed, had eyes only for him and gave chase.

…

[Allied Fleet]

…

The Pegasus Knights, after releasing their net of torpedoes, had returned to the Enterprise for rearming.

"Hurry up with the reload!" Ninya, the quartermaster of the Phoenix Company, commanded. "Get the B loadouts on the Tomcats! Don't leave that platform lying there, get it out of the way!"

_Her message was only slightly diluted by the fact that she opted to wear cat ears…thus, permanently Ninya instead of Nina._

"Loadouts?" Robin glanced at the different munitions (which, as far as she was concerned, resembled some very elaborate pipes) being wheeled out and affixed onto the combat riggings of the Pegasus Knights. "What are the differences between the loadouts? Is there more than one loadout?"

"Type A is for anti-ground, Type B is for anti-ship, Type C is for anti-emplacement." Ninya said quickly. "If you're done reloading move to the catapults, we don't have the time to waste!" She called out to some of the Pegasus Knights.

Those Knights pulled on their reins and led their Pegasi to the catapults before remounting.

"Are we actually in any danger?" Robin asks, squinting to see the enemy ships that are (probably, according to her) headed in their general direction.

"Probably not." Ninya says, looking up at the sky. "But it never hurts to be careful." She unhooks the massive crossbow slung across her back and loads a menacing-looking bolt.

_Ninya is no longer dressed as a maid. Instead, she has armor that is very sniper-esque…just with a little more frills along the sleeves._

She braces the crossbow with her arms and aims it at the sky.

Robin and some of the other Shepherds follow her aim and see an errant Pegasus Knight barreling right towards them.

Ninya pulls the trigger on her crossbow.

The Pegasus Knight's ride is shot and immediately killed, causing the knight to careen off her path of attack and crash into the ocean next to the Enterprise.

"Hurry it up, girls!" Ninya calls out, re-hoisting the crossbow. "We don't have all day!"

"I guess we should help out in the sky as well, huh?" Cynthia stretches. "S-Lunny, wanna come along?"

Severa raises an eyebrow. "Lunny?" She demands as Cynthia mounts up and checks her harnesses, especially the extra ones required for a second rider.

"Better than calling you Moon moon. Now c'mon, we got enemy knights to dismount." Cynthia says happily.

Severa shakes her head in resignation and hops on, sitting in front of Cynthia.

_There's a minor tussle between the two about Severa's hair length._

"Chrom, what are your orders?" Sumia asks of her husband.

"Uh…" Chrom scratches his head. "I don't want to interfere with Ash's operation, plus…" he looks to Robin.

"It's entirely possible for the ship's archers to mistake us as enemies." Robin glances at Ninya, who nods in agreement. "So stay put for now."

"Yes ma'am." Sumia salutes (a little) lazily.

"The two of them are fine, right?" Robin asks Ninya as the Cynthia-Severa combo takes off into the air.

Ninya just taps her headset. "All units, Loki is in the air." She then turns to Robin. "They will be fine."

Robin raises an eyebrow. "There's nothing Low key about them, though…?"

…

[Valmese Fleet]

…

Ignatius grimaces as another set of explosions hit the right flank of his fleet.

"Captain Marius's flagship has been hit!" Ignatius's aide reports as he peers through his spyglass. "Dear Naga, that impact…"

"The most heavily armored ship in our fleet...shit." His tactician growls before grabbing a nearby messenger by the collar. "Tell the mages we need more speed, every minute we spend outside of our ballistae range is a ship lost. GO!"

"Have our lighter ships move forward and screen for the heavier ships." Ignatius commands. "Use their mobility. Make the enemy waste their ammunition."

_The tactician salutes and begins firing flares into the air._

"How's Marius?" Ignatius asks.

The aide reads the flares over Gaius's ship. "They're still afloat. The shot punctured most of the ship but it didn't go through a critical section."

_Even so, that is still a shot that went through most of the ship. _Ignatius thought darkly. "Have his ship fall back, half sail. Use the other ships as cover on his approach."

_The aides nods and fires some flares._

"I don't care what kind of magic you have, Lord of the Coasts." Ignatius growls savagely. "I am the King of the Ocean, and I intend to keep it that way."

…

[Skies over the Allied fleet, about the same time, maybe a minute ago]

…

"Blackbird One to Inazuma, good hit; looks like you hit an enemy command ship."

The two Blackbirds, with their somewhat invisibility-giving barding, circled over the right and middle flanks of the slowly closing crescent of warships.

"Inazuma, roger. Please give us new coordinates." The gunner for the ship replied.

"Continue as you were, left two." Blackbird One replied with a cursory glance down at the surface. She then did a double take. "Two, you see that?"

Blackbird Two looked down as well and saw a series of flares go up, much more urgent than before. "Looks like it's an emergency order from their admiral." Two noted. "Wonder what it's for?"

"Damage assessment, maybe?" Blackbird One mutters as she sees what could only be two ships exchanging messages. "This is Blackbird One to Enterprise."

"This is Enterprise." Ninya replies. "What do you have for us?"

"One of the enemy ships just pulled back behind others…I think it's trying to go for a diversionary tactic." Blackbird One reports. "It's probably going to come out on your left side."

"Roger that." Ninya replies. "Ikatsuchi, did you hear that?"

"Yeah, boss lady. You can count on us." The Ikatsuchi's captain said on radio.

"Nest, keep an eye on our left side." He then called out off radio.

…

"Looks like they fell for it." Ignatius grins slightly as more rounds impact the right flank of his fleet. "Tell the right flank to hold out with all they have; spread out and deploy boarding ships."

His tactician frowns. "So soon?"

"Every little bit counts." Ignatius nods.

"You're the boss."

…

…

[Skies over contested waters]

…

…

Ash pulls a tight circle loop, dazing himself while knocking his pursuing knight off of her Pegasus with his Poleaxe.

_She's probably gonna die on impact. _Ash thought idly as he looked around.

"Shit, we kicked their ass that hard?" He said in surprise (largely to himself) as he noted how few Pegasus Knights were in the air with them. "Condor to flight, status report." He then said into his radio.

"Cherche squadron, all green." Cherche reports. "Three has taken some damage and he's reporting an engine issue."

"Kyle squadron, we're fine here." Kyle (the noble NPC that Cherche picked up) reports. "Light damage across the board."

"Altair squadron, four is injured." The leader of the last group (Altair, not Altaïr) reported. "Nothing a Vulnerary can't heal though."

_Again with the super boring squadron names. _Ash rolls his eyes. "Roger that. Condors, how 'bout you guys?"

"Two, I'm good."

"Three, ok here."

"Four, slightly injured but I'm ok."

Ash nods in satisfaction. "Looks like the rest of them are running home. Stay on overwatch in case they're trying something funny."

Cherche flew up to talk to him without the radio as everyone else acknowledged his order. "Do you think they are up to something?"

Ash shrugs. "No clue. But I don't believe that a fleet that size would only have thirty Pegasus Knights on standby."

"I see." Cherche nods in agreement.

The flight of Wyvern Knights slowly circle around the battlefield, waiting for prey.

Their waiting doesn't last too long…as they saw what looked like the entirety of the enemy air force, comprising of at least a few hundred Pegasus Knights and Wyvern Knights, deploy from the enemy fleet and converge upon the tiny allied fleet.

"Wow." Ash said simply. "Condor to all ships, prepare anti-air weapons. Enterprise, where are our Pegasus Knights?"

"Enterprise here, all of our Pegasus Knights are in the air." Ninya replied.

_Hmm. _Ash sat on that info for a bit. _Enemy ships aren't really close yet, and if we attack too early then then the enemy air force will target our much smaller force. We…can't win in a close quarters combat with our numbers, and trying to land on the Enterprise while bullets are flying everywhere is dangerous. Let's let them stay up there._

"Condor to Rafale." Ash finally said.

"This is Rafale, I'm listening…we have Loki with us too."

_Really? _Ash frowns. _Oh well, makes my life easier. _"Hold position. Loki, cooperate with Halloween."

"You called, boss?" Halloween One jumps in.

_"Yep." Cynthia acknowledges her orders. "You wanna use the gun, Sev? You're a better shot than me." She continued to say, forgetting to cut her radio. Severa said something the radio didn't catch but judging by Cynthia's indignant response it was probably snide._

"Uh…" Ash suddenly remembered that Halloween went up without any anti-air (read: fast firing guns) equipment. "Actually, provide recon support to our ships. Loki, you're coming with me instead."

"oookay?" Cynthia replies. "Whatever you say, boss."

…

[Enterprise]

…

"That's a lot of Pegasus Knights." Robin says with her voice a little higher than normal. "Uh…" She looks around to see a flurry of activity. A lot of the sailors were bringing out some very small, but very round railguns up from the Enterprise's armory.

Robin then guesses (correctly) that the other ships are doing the same. "Are those anti-air weapons?"

"Yes." Ninya replies curtly, finding a place to brace herself as she readied her oversized crossbow. "The Shepherds should go below deck." She says evenly. "As the master would say: we got this covered."

_Wow. She got real cheeky for a maid. _Robin thought. "If you guys fail we die, so no, we're staying up here." Robin replies. "Chrom!"

Chrom scratches his head in irritation. "Even if you want us to, there's not much most of us can do." He glances at the pile of javelins and hand-axes next to him. "I mean…"

Robin sighs. "Yeah, I know…but every little bit counts. Stay under cover and don't get in their way."

Robin then glanced back at the deck of the Enterprise, and widened her eyes in shock. "Where did all those turrets come from?"

"We hide them." Ninya pointed to the extra-thick walls on the left and right sides of the ships, now open to reveal that they were compartmentalized and very much so empty. "All AA guns, ready!"

_The Enterprise, it should be noted, doesn't have a flat deck like a modern American Carrier. Instead, it has some fairly high, thick barriers on either side of the deck and the exit point with the catapults slopes slightly upwards. In all, the Enterprise looks like a marriage between a cargo ship and an unbalanced table._

…

[Valm Airforce]

…

The Valmese Pegasus Knights attached to their navy were a well-respected bunch: it took a lot of balls (metaphorically speaking) to fly and fight over a terrain type that would literally kill you if you landed it in it.

_Most Pegasus Knights can't swim, Phoenix squadron being an exception since he forced them (all of them) to learn it. Splashing around in shallow water is fine though._

Their pride was well reinforced by the fact that they needed to fly well to excel in an environment where a mistake very commonly resulted in death, and that pride was tempered by their tactics and experience.

That experience led them to approach the enemy flagship while flying as low as possible. They reasoned (correctly) that a fleet capable of wiping out other ships at ludicrous distances would have powerful weapons, and thus staying out of the attack angle of the powerful deck weapons was the safest option, even if it made them more vulnerable to archers stationed on the ship.

Thus, they opted to attack the apparently less defended flagship, as the loss of the fleet flagship usually meant confusion and loss of morale among the ranks, and it would make the job of their ships much easier.

_Hah. Looks like they skimped on archers. _One enemy FalcoKnight thought with a smirk when no intercepting fire came from the Enterprise. _Being so sure of your long range ballistae is a curse, you know?_

Their experience taught them well. Unfortunately, guns.

…

The enemy's lead Pegasus knights divided into two groups, one for each side of the massive Enterprise. Upon reaching the hull of their target, they pulled their signature maneuver of climbing straight up almost vertically above their quarry.

What normally happens: the enemies on the ships are momentarily stunned, focused as they would be upon the larger ships that would be in combat range, thus making them easy picking for the barrage of javelins from the Pegasus knights.

What happens here: the sailors manning the anti-aircraft guns and the ones using repeater crossbows all raise their weapons to meet the idiot flyers as they stopped momentarily to aim.

_It's been three seconds so far._

There is the roar of the anti-aircraft guns, and the Valmese Knights are struck and fall to the ocean along with a shower of blood and feathers.

…

The FalcoKnight made a snap decision and her squad of ten quickly arrested their climb, all the while as the bodies of their compatriots dropped to the ocean around them.

_One of her Knights was struck by a corpse and the added weight dropped her into the water. Her armor dragged her under very quickly._

Their speed, not spent in the climb, took them past the Enterprise, and they stopped to assess the situation while their captain (the FalcoKnight) stared in horror.

The rest of the Pegasus Knights, realizing that their element of surprise was lost, proceeded to their and true Plan B: pull up to the level of the ship deck and close in for in-fighting. That way, even if they were faced with superior archer numbers, they could dismount and fight with their feet on relatively solid ground.

_All Valmese air units carry a sword and buckler for short range fighting if such a thing happens._

The Valmese FalcoKnight watched in horror as the rest of the Valm's air force pulled up to the deck's level, intent on closing in with their lances…and then take fire from the strange machines on the deck, tumbling into the ocean after a shower of blood and feathers.

…

[Enterprise Deck]

…

The Shepherds watched in undisguised horror as the anti-air deck guns took down the Valm Pegasus Knights as quickly as they appeared over the deck walls.

"I'm…I'm really happy that we don't have to fight them hand to hand, but…" Vaike mutters. "This just doesn't feel right."

_One Pegasus Knight, taken by her momentum, sails over the deck as she was struck and lands in a bloodied pile on the deck._

"That's…" Lissa instinctively takes out her healing staff.

"Rescue crew! Get that girl away from her mount!" Ninya yells down onto the deck. "Please attend to her." She says to the Shepherds observing along with her.

"Are you sure? She is an enemy." Fredrick scowls.

"Master's orders." Ninya nods. "Anyone who cannot fight is to be treated as if they were a wounded ally."

Robin caught a Pegasus Knight taking a five-round burst from an anti-air turret and winced as it separated the girl's arm from the rest of her body, and then half of her body from the other half. "Considering how many are lost in a fight like this, that may be the only option."

_The unfortunate girl's remains sailed over the ship and crashed into the ocean._

"Let us go, Lisse." Maribelle says after the Valmese knight was extracted from the goop that used to be her ride. "That girl needs our help."

"Uh…right." Lisse gulps and follows.

…

[Valmese Air force]

…

To their credit, the remainders of the Valmese air units rallied very quickly despite suffering severe losses due to their ill-fated attack on the Enterprise.

Unfortunately, the amount of time their rally took allowed Ash and the rest of the Wyvern squadron to bear down upon them, and given that the Wyvern squadron had their short range guns…

…well, it doesn't end well for the Valmese.

…

[1st Person Camera]

…

I feel like I would be enjoying this more if this was actually just a videogame instead of…y'know, us shooting girls in the back while they run away in terror. As it is it's just a bad taste in my mouth.

_After we arrived on scene we flew above the Valmese Pegasus Knights and pinned them on a lower altitude just so the anti-air weapons could take them out easier._

And if they were brave enough to try and tango with us…well, we shot 'em.

This continued until the remnants of the Valmese Knights, numbering around thirty or so, called it quits and left in a hurry.

_300 kills in ten minutes._

The water around the Enterprise is just littered with corpses. It's red, too.

The Enterprise itself has no small shortage of blood and meat on its deck either. Sheesh.

Calming breathes. "Condor to Fleet. All ships, report in."

"Enterprise here," Ninya. "We've lost a few sailors and have taken a few enemies hostage."

"Akatsuki, the enemy air attack was light; Continuing barrage on enemy warships."

"Hibiki, we were not attacked at all."

"Ikatsuchi, our main gunner crew is injured, the ship's in good shape otherwise. Watching for enemy maneuvers."

"Inazuma, we've taken almost all of the aerial attackers against us hostage. We have around 30 of them."

…

On one hand, I feel like a monster for such a one-sided slaughter.

_On the other hand, we feel like a fucking BADASS for such a one-sided slaughter._

Let's…not think about this for the time being. We have almost 2000 people relying on our warships to avoid dying outright.

"All ships continue barrage." We order (a bit unnecessarily). "Blackhawk, Halloween, report status on enemy warships."

"Halloween here: they're just still sailing towards us." Halloween one sounds like she's pouting. "Can I take off my leash now? This is suffocating."

_We smile with a bit of discomfort, since Halloween One has an odd fondness for leashes. We've caught her wearing one at least three times now._

"Blackhawk here: the enemy ships are trying to maintain distance from each other in their charge…we think they might be in ballistae range soon."

In other words: T-minus one minute until we're fucked.

_Give or take ten minutes._

"Alright…" This is gonna be ba…aad?

Looks like something's happening to the Valm's left flank.

…

[Valm Fleet, Left Flank]

…

"What the…captain, there's a bunch of fish swimming towards us."

One of the assault ship captains turn to follow his aide's arm, squinting to see exactly what "fish" she was referring to.

He saw a blanket of somewhat quick moving white streaks in the ocean.

"Some weird fish we got in these waters." The captain raises an eyebrow and thought nothing of it. "Keep your eyes on the enemy ships. We don't want to get hit by their ballistae."

"Yeah, yeah." His aide rolls her eyes. "Not like we can do anything even if we stare really hard, though."

…

[Valm Fleet, Ignatius's Flagship]

…

Ignatius heard a disturbingly rapid series of explosions come from the left side of his fleet.

"The shit?" Was the consensus among him and his staff even as they focused their attention upon the left side with their spyglasses.

"Doesn't look like anything's off." His aide murmured. "What were those explosions?"

His tactician sent up a series of flares, and frowned when there was no response. "Did the left flank get hit?"

"It sounds like it, but…" His aide shook his head. "I mean, the ships are still in one piece."

"Wait." Ignatius growled, still focused upon the left fleet.

The left fleet that has apparently stopped...while black smoke floated up from the ships.

"That's…impossible." His tactician, weak kneed, collapsed against the railing.

The left flank of the fleet, totaling a hundred ships, was on fire.

…

[1st Person Camera]

…

For a minute there I was worried that the torpedoes didn't detonate. From up here it doesn't look as if all the ships were struck though.

"Holy shit, boss." One of the ship captains exclaimed.

"Don't get cocky. Some of the ships are still alive in that mess." I remind him. "Condor to Rafale, Halloween. You are hereby cleared for unilateral action against all enemy warships."

"About time." Halloween One grumbles. "Oy, you lot. We call dibs on the right flank."

"If you say so." Rafale One replies with an audible shrug. "We'll take care of the enemy's main fleet, then."

"Roger that." We go off radio… if only they played nicely with each other. "Cherche, Kyle. You two will provide cover for Halloween. Everyone else, follow me."

_The Wyvern Knights split into two groups as the mass of Allied Forces Pegasus Knights descend upon the main enemy fleet._

…

[Valm, Right Flank]

…

"Sir, the left flank is on fire!"

"I can see that!" The admiral of the right fleet (Marius) snapped. "Alert all ships to spread out further and begin ballistae attacks on the enemy warships; do everything possible to reduce their accuracy!"

_The reporting mage salutes and fires off flares. His fleet obeys and spreads out some, while the front-most ships release the bolts on their ballistae that they had held on for so long._

It has been roughly fifteen minutes since the beginning of the battle.

The ballistae bolts don't come anywhere near the allied warships, but they do create a blanket of explosions in the water that obscure the targeting of the destroyers…if only for a moment.

...

However, the problem was actually over their heads.

"Halloween One to two and Loki…" All three girls checked their straps and bracing one last time (it would be pretty embarrassing to lose their grip and drop the only cannon they brought with them into the ocean). "Cleared to fire."

…

Marius snapped his head around when he heard the shattering of wood.

The escort ship next to his (tasked with defending his crippled ship against further fire) just took a direct hit to its deck, as he could very clearly see from the shower of woodchips from the ship.

"How are they doing this?!" Marius, under the impression that the damage came from the Destroyers, snarled. "What kind of sorcery do they have?!"

_He believes that the Destroyers are arcing their shots above the wall of seawater his side of the fleet was erecting._

To his credit he quickly realized that the incoming fire was not coming from the ship when seven ships reported damage in almost as many seconds. "Archers! Archers, full alert!" He roared as he scanned the sky…and only saw three Pegasus Knights in the air.

_This must be fantasy. _Was the last thought though his head, as lucky shot from Halloween Two struck him on the head and tore it clean from his body and nailed it to the deck two levels down. The second and third shots tore through the deck of his flagship, sealing its fate as wreckage as it began to take on water.

…

[Valm, Center Flank]

…

Ignatius was a bit more on the ball. "Alert the archers; they're coming for the finishing blow." He grimaced.

"Pegasus Knights. What's he going to do to us with Pegasus Knights?" His tactician half wondered, half despaired.

"Do we have any air power left?" His aide asked.

"We do, but they refuse to go up in the air." The tactician sighed. "Their morale is utterly shattered."

_To no surprise. _Ignatius thought. "Tell the archers to fire regardless of their chances of hitting. We must keep the enemy air units from reaching our ships." He then glanced at his aide. "Are they in place?"

"Should be. I told them to move faster than normal since we were up against unknowns." The tactician replied. "Never thought we'd lose both flanks of our fleet in fifteen minutes, though."

"They're not totally lost. There's no way the enemy could have sunk every single ship they hit." The aide snapped.

Which was true. While the Valmese navy's staggered line formation weakened theirs ships individually, the increase in maneuverability (and smokescreen provided by at least half the ships on each flank being on fire) meant that the smaller, lighter boarding ships (meant to be used after the assault ships have made contact with the target) and the super light ballistae ships (meant to conduct stand-off combat with the enemy) were actually fairly ok.

Well, relatively ok: if either type of ships were actually hit by the deck guns of the Destroyers they would be immediately sunk. However, the fact that there were only eight deck guns in the entirety of the allied navy forced them to prioritize the larger enemy ships, as they provided both a bigger threat and an easier target to hit…and even then it took at least five shots to reliably hit and sink a moving target at the distances the Destroyers were fighting at.

"If they make it it will be good for us." Ignatius says, taking a bow and firing an arrow into the sky (to no real effect). "For now, concentrate on staying alive."

"Aye." His tactician pulls out his strongest Arcwind spellbook.

…

[Above them]

…

"Condor to flight," Ash says upon seeing Ignatius's gleaming heavy armor. "You are hereby cleared to attack. Don't sink the enemy flagship, though."

"Roger roger. Rafales, on me." Rafale One climbed a little and dove towards the first heavy warships she saw.

…

"Here they come." The captain of the ship the Rafales were targeting mutters. "Archers! Unleash barrage!"

His contingent of archers unleashes a barrage of arrows into the air, scaring the Rafales to pull up and pull away.

The captain's aide clenches his fist in victory. "Hah! Without their long range ballistae they're nothing much."

_Those girls' pull out looked far more professional than a mere evasion. _The captain's tactician thought…but didn't voice it, as the captain was a little prideful at times and they needed him to keep a cool head right now.

There was a few seconds of seeming silence, filled by nothing but the wind on the sails and the waves against the ship hull…

And then the sail broke. There was a sizable hole in the sail, roughly the size of a fist.

And then the sail caught on fire.

And then there was the crack of wood as something struck the hull.

And then the deck caught on fire.

And then the deck underneath that caught on fire.

And then the deck underneath _that _caught on fire.

And then that deck was no longer on fire because it was now being submerged in water.

"It has to be dropped weapon. It has to be." The captain snarled as he saw the conflagration on his ship. "Abandon ship! Get out! Now!"

"I wish I knew how to swim." His aide grumbles while tearing off his armor.

_The tactician learned to, just in case._

The captain saw another quad of Pegasus knights perform the same action above another ship, and saw it catch on fire as well…moments before a wind caught his attention. He turned his head and saw a Pegasus Knight…a small girl with bright, orange hair point something at him.

That would be the last thing he ever saw.

_Bonus points: Tomcat Two shot him in the eye in her daring low-sweep._

…

"Please don't do that again." Ash sighed in relief as the orange haired girl in front of him pulled away from the burning enemy ship.

"Sorry, boss." The girl laughed.

_Ash had seen her go down for a flyby and took the Condors to assist just in case._

"All units, no need to be hasty, the enemy aren't sending up air units yet." Ash reminded the rest of his girls. "Take your time and make each shot count."

"Roger." One of the girls respond, and another ship goes up in flames.

_Did Ninya give us only incendiaries? _Ash wondered idly.

The Wyvern flight didn't have much they could do, as they didn't take any extra munitions in favor of fighting the air war, so Ash and his flight took their time flying unnecessary support.

…

[Enterprise]

…

Lissa stretches and lets out a sigh of relief. "How long would a naval battle like this usually last, Robin?" She asks.

"If either side had around three hundred ships? Uh…" Robin taps her chin. "At least half a day."

"At this rate he's gonna be done in half an hour." Basilio breathes. "I'm very glad I pulled all the strings I could now."

"He's going to be a member of your court, then?" Emmeryn says politely.

Basilio laughs dryly. "I wish. Whatever's in that head of his, working under someone else is definitely not his end goal."

"This will change the face of war forever." Miriel breathes, with fear and reverence in equal measure in her voice. "This…what can one even call something such as this?"

"I believe boss called it a 'curb-stomp battle'." Morgan replies happily.

"History will either remember this as how all wars in the future will be fought…or an aberration best forgotten." Virion's laugh was hollow. "I believe no tactician will admit to the sheer implausibility of an event such as this."

"If I'm not seeing it right here, I wouldn't believe it either." Robin grumbles. "This is a war fought with money, not skill." She kicks the railing in discontent. "I don't like it."

"Well, if the only thing being spent is money, its way better than having people die…" Lissa trails off when she sees the bloodied deck of the Enterprise. "Well, better than having our people die." She stretches again and turns, then stops for a second. "Did we have allies back there?"

Robin wheels around and brings a spyglass up. "They look like merchant ships." She said after a moment.

"Oh." Lissa notes.

…

_Moment of silence as the Shepherds and Ninya (plus her support staff) turn to look._

…

"Nina, can you contact Ash?" Robin asks.

"What's wrong with the merchant ships?" Ninya gets ready to power up her radio earpiece.

Robin shrugs. "Don't know, don't care. No merchant ship wanders this close to a combat area without a damn good reason."

"Noted." Ninya nods. "Enterprise to Blackbird."

_The Blackbirds have stronger radios. _"Blackbird Two here. What do you want, Nina?"

"Alert Condor. There are possibly hostile ships behind the fleet."

_Another moment of silence._

"Wait, really? How did they get that far?"

"Just pass the message." Ninya snaps.

_They do._

"Really? Ok…huh." Ash scratches his head. "Pass message back to the Enterprise…and all Destroyers. They are hereby cleared to use the Thunderbolt add-ons, and keep an eye open on the incoming ships. Have Chrom threaten them or something."

"Got it, boss."

…

_Ninya passes on the message._

"What are these Thunderbolt addon…things?" Robin asks.

"Short range fire option for the deck guns." Morgan replies. "It helps cover the guns' inherent weakness against multiple targets."

Robin wasn't quite sure what was being said, but it sounded awesome.

Morgan, upon seeing Robin's slightly blank expression, just gestured to one of their warships.

…

Over to their left, the Akatsuki's rear gun was hurriedly being brought down for field outfitting.

Robin watched as several crews of sailors brought out what looked like eight sets of rails and a large box out of their storage and quickly assembled it around the deck gun.

She frowns upon the realization. "Multiple barrels?"

"You got it, m-a'am." They know they're related, but since Morgan's father was currently unconfirmed Ash had reminded him to be cautious…y'know, lest he becomes accidentally destroyed by a time paradox. "As the boss would say, 'it is the most Russian solution.'"

_What? _Robin was even more confused.

_Ash's solution to an arguably nonexistent problem—the cannon that can kill ships in a single shot wasn't doing its killing fast enough—was to, quite literally, strap more rails onto the gun barrel. Instead of a crew of 4 per gun (sniper for aiming/firing, mage for providing power, 2 sailors to turn and actually move the cannon) it now has twenty (1 sniper, 9 mages, 10 sailors for moving the cannon and rapid reloading)._

_Upside: it fires roughly one round per second._

_Downside: it goes maybe half as far and hits half as hard. Also, prolonged use will cause it to catch on fire._

…

While not necessarily as expected, the merchant fleet behind the allied force suddenly went to full sails and turned to charge towards the massive target that is the Enterprise…and the transports behind it.

"Shit. Turnabout!" The captain of the Hibiki roared. "Put ourselves between those shitheads and the transports! Prepare the anchors!"

_The Deck Gun uses enough magic to have a kick when it fires. The Thunderbolt Deck Gun, if not properly secured, will capsize the Destroyer if it fires long enough._

The Hibiki, with the maneuverability granted to it by the rudder/turbine/jets under the water combination (imagine tubes designed to push water from one side of the ship to another via magic) moved from its position in front of the fleet to behind it with surprising speed.

"I want a ship that fast." The merchant fleet captain grumbles. "Imagine all the money I'd make on trade."

"Captain," his first mate reminds him. "The enemy ships are heavily armed and armored. We best be careful."

The captain grumbles some more. "Yeah, yeah…ready the ballistae!"

…

"Hibiki, be advised." The Hibiki captain heard though his radio earpiece. "The enemy's flanking fleet is within ballistae range. Don't hesitate."

"Hibiki here, we got it." The captain replies. "Alright lads! Broadside, drop anchor!"

The Hibiki reveals its nine-barrel Thunderbolt cannon mounted on the aft of the ship to the Valmese merchant navy.

"That's a pretty big looking ballista." The enemy captain murmurs. "Open fire! Sink the enemy warship!"

His fleet of twenty five merchant ships, each one armed with three light ballistae (good for taking down smaller pirates but not so good against large warships) opened fire as one on the Destroyer a few hundred meters in front of them.

"Whoa, we're actually getting shot at." One of the sailors on the Hibiki noted. "We good, guys?"

"We're good." The sniper in charge of the Thunderbolt grinned like a little boy. "We are SO good."

"Ok…don't get too into it, or you'll kill all of us." The lead mage in charge of providing power to the gun reminds him. "I'll hunt you down in the afterlife if you kill us."

"Hey, hey." The sniper grins. "Short bursts, right? I'm not gonna kill you or your sweet little girl."

The lead mage's sweet little girl—a quiet girl with pearly light hair—smiles slightly in response.

"Alright…let's do this!" The sniper pressed the trigger.

The Hibiki was then struck by a ballistae bolt.

...

"Hit! Nice work!" The merchant captain clenched his fist in victory.

He then heard a series of booms from the enemy ship, and then watched in shock (with his fist still clenched in victory) as the oceans around them exploded in plumes upon plumes of water.

"Holy fucking shit we're not paid enough for this." The merchant captain concluded once the explosions halted and revealed the utter shredding of all but five of his ships. "Full sails! Get us out of here!"

"Valm won't be happy about this." His first mate reminds him.

"Valm can go fuck a bag of lemons." The captain snaps in response, jabbing a finger at the Hibiki. "Against something like THAT no money is worth it."

The first mate stared at one of the ships utterly in tatters, its pieces scattering over the ocean surface, and agreed readily…before firing a series of bright flares into the air.

…

"Hibiki, damage report." Ninya demanded. "Hibiki." She repeated when she received no response.

"Hold yer horses, we're fine." The Hibiki's captain replied evenly. "The ship's in no danger of sinking." He peers over the railing into the ocean. "The shot hit the armored section and bounced off."

"That surprised me." The mage captain of the gun sighed. "How's it looking up there…are you alright?"

The sniper in charge of the gun was crying. "This is the best thing I've ever used in my entire life." He said tearfully. "I want to marry it."

The mage captain shared a worried glance with his daughter. "Sure…if you say so."

"Alright, lads!" Their captain caught their attention. "We're moving back into position! Reel the anchors!"

…

…

[Valm Fleet]

…

…

Ignatius saw the bright flares fired by the merchant fleet and sighed.

"Assault started and failed." The tactician interpreted. "Within the timespan of a minute." He glanced at Ignatius…and then at the sea of fire around them. "Uhm…"

"Do it." Ignatius shook his head in defeat.

…

[Over their heads]

…

_There it is, there it is. _Ash thought with relief when he saw the flares over the Valmese flagship. "Condor to all units! Cease fire! Cease fire! The enemy fleet has surrendered!"

"Yeah!" Cynthia screamed into her mike and then winced in pain, and then winced in more pain as Severa slapped her on her head.

"Whew." Ash breathed, observing the enemy ships sunk (and burned) from his vantage point in the sky. "Well done, folks. All units return to ship. Blackbirds, bring the good news. I need to go talk to a few people."

…

Ignatius looked up to see a single Wyvern rider descend to circle above their heads. "Admiral," the Wyvern Knight said with an unworldly booming voice. "Bring your ship outwards and collect the rest of your fleet. We'll discuss terms in a few hours."

"So he can magnify his own voice." The tactician threw up his arms in exasperation as the knight flew away. "What else is he gonna do?"

_Why a few hours? _Ignatius wondered before sending up a series of flares for his ships.

…

When Ash was close enough to the Enterprise: "alright, Condor to all allied assets, we will now commence SAR. Hurry it up."

…

"So after sinking three hundred ships he's going to spend the rest of the day picking their sailors out of the water?" Maribelle's eyebrow was dangerously high. "What an odd, odd man."

Emmeryn, however, was beaming…as much as would be possible after seeing long distance carnage. "He fights a war but not against the people."

"But he still killed most of them." Maribelle mutters. "Not much we can justify about that."

"Better them than us." Fredrick says very matter-of-factly. "And better still that we save some of them than leaving all of them to die in the cold."

"Can we help?" Sumia asks Ninya. "With the…uh…thing."

"Enterprise to Condor. The Shepherds want to help with SAR." Ninya says into her radio.

"Yeah, give 'em some spare equipment; the more we have out there, the better." Was Ash's response.

…

…

[Post-battle, dusk]

[1st Person Camera]

…

…

Of the 325 ships (plus the hired merchant navy that bugged out VERY fast) a total of 157 survived (+5 merchant ships).

"That's way more than I expected." Robin commented. "All things considered."

Yep.

"Same here." The Valmese tactician agreed. "It feels like if we kept at it we would've been able to win against you guys."

_We brought Ignatius and his close retainers aboard the Enterprise for negotiations…under close guard, of course._

We're all sitting in the war room around the large war table in the center of the room, with the Valmese on one side, us plus shepherds on the other.

"You forget that the merchant navy, despite being in range to attack, was utterly repelled." Fredrick reminds them.

"Meh, mercenaries are always unreliable." The Valmese aide waves it off.

"Gregor be taking offense at that statement." Gregor grumbles.

But really, "I'm a little annoyed your fleet didn't reach the medium to short range of the fight. I would've liked to have tested the other equipment we had, but eh."

_Momentary silence._

"You had other weapons?" Valm's tactician said in a disbelieving deadpan. "Apart from that super long range ballista?"

I shrug. "Well…yeah." I start counting off fingers. "Thunderbolts, Sledgehammers, Torpedoes, the works."

"So…" The tactician prods me to continue.

To Summarize. "So the Destroyers are best at medium range; a bit of a pity the battle ended so quickly, really."

_The Valm staff stares at us in disbelief._

"The hero complains that he won too quickly." Basilio shakes his head in dispair. "So why did you bring these guys on your ship? It's not exactly normal for us to leave enemy bosses alive."

Heh.

Shit, must resist grin. "Well…I find it difficult to believe that a nation like Valm would have a well-developed naval structure."

"That's true." The Valm aide mutters. "We're all Rosanne soldiers."

Rosanne…

Rosanne?

_Virion's turf._

Oh.

…wait, Virion's turf was coastal?

_Dude. The entire reason we brought them on board was because Valm was like Ylisse, not exactly a coastal powerhouse._

I know, but I didn't think they would actually be Rosannese.

Also, people names really shouldn't be used for country names.

"I didn't know Rosanne was coastal." We say out loud.

Cherche jumps to our rescue. "Do you have a map? I can show you where our country used to be."

We do. Also, the Valmese people snapped to glare at Cherche when she said what she did.

_We put the map on the table._

"Rosanne covers this area." She draws a circle around the top section of the island of Valm.

In retrospect I could've guessed this.

_The island of Valm (according to the map we're using) is split like a T-bone Steak (with an inverted bone) by a series of large in-land seas. Valm proper is the top left section, and Cherche circled around the top right section._

I have doubts about how accurate this map is, but Rosanne's status as a breadbasket makes sense if it has this territory. It seems to be mostly plains.

"Who are you?" The aide demands of Cherche.

"His attendant." Cherche replies evenly.

The aide opens his mouth but Ignatius stops him. "Lord Ash, what are your terms? We have already surrendered."

Yeah, uh… "Hm…well, for starters, your navy will be responsible for securing the Valm coastline against pirates, raiders, and all sorts of bad elements."

_Moment of silence._

"That's…quite gracious of a demand." Ignatius says slowly.

"Yeah, we were already doing that." The aide adds.

We nod. "I know, I know. The biggest problem in the world is the Risen, so the less people we have to kill, the better."

"So the Risen are active in the other continent as well." The tactician says softly. "I guess that put a wrench in Dalton's plans, eh?"

"The fool was a Valmese moron. He had no plan." The aide spat.

…inter-party conflict? Good. Interparty conflict that may or may not be geopolitically driven? Less than good.

"Enough, the two of you." Ignatius rebukes his men. "I suppose, Lord Ash, you expect us to swear allegiance to you as well?"

…

Huh.

"It'll make things faster, I guess." I shrug. "Point is, so long as your fleet leaves our ships alone I'm fine with it."

"What if we betray you?" The tactician asks smugly.

_Fredrick goes to unsheathe his sword, but Chrom raises a hand to stop him._

"We'll burn your ships to the ground." I frown. "Did you or did you not pay attention during the day?"

The tactician simply shrugs with a grin. I wonder why he asked that?

"If I may." Ignatius gets my attention. "For what reason are you doing this? We are your enemies."

"You _were_." I correct him. "You lost, so you get to do what I tell you." I grin.

"That's not how diplomacy works." Maribelle mutter in sync with the Valm tactician.

"It's how victory works." I grin harder. "Besides, if given the opportunity I'd rather be taking the fight to the Risen, and I believe you feel the same way."

"My goal is to preserve the safety of our coastline." Ignatius replies…a little stubbornly? "Against all invaders that may harm our country."

Bleh.

_The aide has been scanning the Shepherds for a while now. He eventually seems to find what he's looking for and suddenly springs to action._

Whoa wait what

_The aide jumps onto the table with a small knife drawn. He takes two steps on the table before_

Before we aim a railgun at his head and arm it with an ominous hum.

_Yay for sound spells._

The obvious threat of the weapon was enough to stop the aide, even though he obviously has no idea what it is.

"Care to explain?" Robin glares at him, her hands crackling with the telltale signs of a Thoron.

_Considering that Robin, Miriel, and Morgan were ready to fire, the aide was THIS close to being reduced to a splatter on the ceiling._

"Why the hell is HE here?!" The aide jabs his sword (from an extremely safe distance) at Virion, who's hanging out near the wall furthest from the Valm folks.

"He's a unit in the Shepherds. What of it?" I demand.

"Ash…" Virion says quietly.

"He's a traitor to his people and a coward!" The aide spat. "He's going to betray the lot of you as soon as your campaign loses steam."

"Enough." Ignatius warns his aide. "Do not forget that we are the losing party here."

The aide glares at Virion. "Dammit!" He does, however, (violently) sit back down.

"Virion, we need to have a word after this." I say to him.

"Ash, Virion is our friend." Chrom reminds me firmly. "Don't let the words of a Valmese sway you."

"We're not Valmese, you daft moron." The aide growls. "We're Rosannite, through and through."

Eh…Rosannese sounds better, but ok.

_It's just your opinion, man._

"Enough." Ignatius growls again.

"Don't worry about it, Chrom. I'm not going to eat him." I laugh…a little forcefully. "Well, back to the task at hand. Since you guys are not exactly friends of Valm, then there shouldn't be an issue with the lot of you keeping the coastline secure…and neutral, right?"

"You fucking moron." The tactician mutters and slaps the aide on the back of his head. He then looks at me. "Do you plan to invade Rosanne?"

"No, we do not." Emmeryn reassures him…she's technically the big boss of the campaign.

But I'm the one holding the diplomacy cards here. "We probably will have to. If Valm is allowed to keep the breadbasket under their control then we'll be in for a long, drag out war." I can feel glares on the back of my head for usurping Emmeryn's authority. "That being said, the less damage we end up doing, the better."

"I suppose we don't have a choice in the matter." Ignatius says after a minute of deliberation. "We are hereby under your command, Lady Emmeryn."

"Thank you." Emmeryn bows slightly. "Please keep your people safe, Admiral Ignatius."

…

[Some time later]

…

We get Virion into our captain's quarters.

"Well…I have to say I don't swing this way." Virion shrugs with a wry smile.

I'm tired and the fact that the Shepherds aren't too happy with me is a little hurty on my nerves. "Yeah, yeah, hilarious." _We say tersely. _"I need to know: how badly are you hated in Rosanne?"

"You wound me with such words, Lord of the Coasts." Virion theatrically covers his heart with a hand.

Seriously? "I'm not in the mood for your bullshit, Virion." I threaten. "I can't bar you from the operation since you're not under my command, but I'll be damned if your past gets my girls killed."

"I…see." Virion takes us seriously. "In that case, hear me well."

…

[One Exposition Later]

…

Well, fuck. I guess.

…

…

…

[Meanwhile, Virion's quarters]

…

…

Virion, after being questioned by Ash, retired to his room, where a man waited for him.

"Ignatius, I see you're still as clever as ever." Virion sighs and sinks into a chair. "My word, the young aspiring lord is even more protective of his charges than Chrom is."

"He certainly gave off the aura of a man who cares for his subordinates." Ignatius nods. "Though I doubt it is due to a professional interest."

"They are 'his' girls." Virion laughs lightly, and then trails off into silence for a moment. "It is good to see you well, old friend."

"Indeed. I heard that you came home last year. I'm sorry to have missed your visit." Ignatius grunts. "We could've had a drink or two."

"It was a trip that needed peace and quiet, no offense to your children." Virion says jokingly. "Plus, I heard that you were responsible for organizing the Valmese fleet at the time."

"That I was." Ignatius agrees. "As it stands, what's left of the Valmese fleet is under my direct control."

"My thanks…and my apologies, for raising arms against my trusted retainers." Virion bows to Ignatius.

Ignatius frowns. "You do realize that your return to Rosanne will not be easy…"

"I am aware." Virion nods. "However, after seeing what our young Ash is capable of, I feel compelled to try."

Ignatius chuckles. "After seeing what he's capable of, I feel like I need to retire." He then kneels in front of Virion. "Allow me the honor of being the first to welcome your return, your highness."

"Second. You're second." Cherche, who was listening in outside of Virion's room, clarifies. "I have already taken that honor."

Ignatius shakes his head. "Whatever you say, Cherche."

"She does still correspond with your wife, Ignatius." Virion reminds him in a low tone.

"My wife can handle whatever Cherche can throw at her." Ignatius smirks slightly.

"I have some recipes I think she will find intriguing." Cherche says lackadaisically to herself.

"Your grace, it would be highly unnecessary for you to go to such lengths." Ignatius says with as much humbleness in his voice as he could muster.

_The three of them continue to talk, joke, and chat well into the night._

…

…

…

Following the battle against the Valmese fleet, what's left of the Valm's fleet reorganized themselves into five sub-fleets, and stationed themselves along the Valm's coastline, focusing primarily on protecting and holding the port towns.

One of the fleets got a little bit ballsy when they saw the Allied Fleet as it sailed towards the Valm's coast, and had decided to turn traitor (kinda) and engage. The resulting battle lasted about five minutes, as the fleet decided to sail suspiciously close to the Destroyers (to maximize their chances) before starting engagement, giving the good guys plenty of time to prepare their defenses.

"Mooooroooons." Lissa had neatly summarized after the Allied fleet sailed past the burning wrecks of the Valm detachment.

After around four days of sailing, the Allied Fleet arrived within sight range of the Valm coast.

_Due to the difference in sailing speed, the Allied Fleet arrived at the coast before the Valm detachments, which would reach their designated points three days afterwards._

…

[1st Person Camera]

…

Uh…

_We stand on the bridge of the Enterprise, peering intently at the town we're targeting through a spyglass._

"Robin, take a look through this and tell me what you see." I pass the spyglass to her.

Robin peers through the spyglass. "Uh…" She then does a double take. "It's on fire."

"Oh, good. Then I'm not hallucinating." Scratch head, think carefully… "Ninya, get the Blackbirds into the air. Cherche, you're flying support just in case. I want to know what's going on inside that town."

_Ninya salutes and start giving out orders as we take another look at the town._

From all the way out here, it's hard to see what's going on besides the fact that there are plumes of smoke above the town from several different places. The town itself is pretty sprawling, covering a large amount of the coastline…if I had to guess, I'd say that the town doesn't drive too deeply inland. We can probably shell the entire area with our Destroyers if need be.

_The town needs to be pretty huge to be out of gun range for us._

So the question is…

"Who or what is in that town?" Robin reads my mind. Figuratively. Not literally. I hope not literally. We're relatively dirty minded.

_ANYWAYS we wait for a few hours for the scouts to come back._

While we waited we made sure all of the units are prepped and ready to go.

…

After the scouts came back, we went over the images they took.

Uh…well.

The town is pretty large and for the most part it hugs the coastline, so I'm assuming the town is more about fishing than trade…either that, or Valmese trade ships are pretty small.

_There's a small section of docks near the north side of the town that seem to be pretty large. If we need to take the town over we can dock the Destroyers over there._

There's no dock large enough for the Enterprise (except the one built specifically for it back home), so it'll just have to be moored offshore…either way.

"Alright, what are we seeing here?" Chrom asks the Blackbird girls as he scans the blanket of images they took arranged on the massive war room table.

…

So, to summarize…this…clusterfuck.

Ok. Let's divide the town into five sections.

_We look down at it from a bird's eye view. The right side of the town is North._

First off, even if this isn't the town for the chapter right after the sea battle, it is now.

The left and bottom sides of the town are under Valm control. Their garrisons are strongest there and there are a lot of them. We think they're Valmese since the troops in those two areas are the most well organized and have the best equipment.

The top side of the town has rebels. The rebels are currently in active combat with the Valmese garrison. We don't know how long they've been fighting or under what leadership, but I think we can guess at who's leading the party. Personally I'm happy she's not a damsel in distress, but in a sense giving an NPC a sword is pretty much a death sentence…

The entirety of the town has guerilla militia…or at least the Blackbirds think so. Every so often we'd see a small contingent of people under some kind of semi-cohesive structure with crappy gear. The Blackbirds also think that the militia is either on Valm's side or hostile to everyone. It's a little hard to tell from just a scouting trip in the air. The militia…_technically_, is in charge of the town center, as most of the militia tends to gather there, and Valm's attacks (when not trying to push out the rebels) tend to gravitate towards that direction.

The right side of the town is being systematically stripped down by Risen. There aren't a lot of them, but there's a few of them that are huge. Lucina thinks they might be Type Three Risen (apparently immortal, according to her) and she volunteered the Future Kids to deal with those things. Emmeryn tentatively approves, and we're granting her ship support in case she needs it.

The left side of the town, outside of the town, holds a Plegian army camp. I don't know how did they get there or why, but the Valm did station men on the walls between them and the Plegian camp, so the two of them are hostile.

_So to recap: the town right now has five distinct entities fighting in a close quarter battle within its streets._

When we jump in it will be six. Judging by the pictures the battle is very skirmish-y, with a lot of door-to-door urban fighting. We're going to be at a severe disadvantage since we don't know the layout on the ground.

"Doesn't matter." Robin had said when I brought this up. "Rouse the men; we're preparing a beachhead invasion."

Her plan is to hit the right side of the town first and clean up the Risen, go north to join up with the rebels, and then swing downwards to crush the Valm between them and the ocean.

One problem.

"Robin, it's about…" we glance at the sky. "An hour until dusk. By the time we get our shit together it's going to be dark." And fighting an urban war in the dark in unknown territory against five possible enemies is, to put it politely, bad.

"Ugh." She gets my point though. "Fine…have the men ready by dawn tomorrow."

.

.

.

{ === + === }

Author Notes:

This is my pre-Fallout 4 release.

See y'all in a few months.

Technology notes (since there wasn't a good place to put it in the story proper)

Thunderbolts – literally just a bunch of guns glued together.

AA cannons – Imagine a three-barrel gatling gun mounted on a bicycle, and you'll have it. It uses a pedal-powered loading device to load stones into the gun ports (in a way similar to a watermill) where they get accelerated by magical lightning as normal.

AA guns – Crossbows with specially engineered reloader components, to make it easier to reload while still maintaining most of a Crossbow's punch.

Sledgehammers – Short range electrified scattergun. Basically a small bag of rocks loaded into electrified rails.

Torpedoes – tubes mounted on ships that fire torpedoes via wind. They fly faster than the Pegasus mounted ones (since they get extra initial speed) but that's about it.

Ninya's cat ears – it's purple to match her hair and is made of soft velvet.


	30. Valm Campaign - Landing

{ === + === }

[Valmese Garrison Camp Headquarters]

…

…

Within the boundaries of the coastal city, the three parties vying for control had been engaged in battle for the past three days.

…well, that's not exactly true, but two out of three parties agree on that narrative, and majority rules.

As far as the Valmese forces are concerned, this was a battle to maintain peace and order throughout the city, a battle that they were winning inch by inch through the city streets.

"Report." The Valmese garrison captain (A Great Knight and thus not the chapter boss) motioned to his aides.

"Sir." The aide looked over his notes. "Our northern division is pushing the rebel troops back; while they still hold the walls our position on the ground and our troop quality proves itself superior day after day."

The captain nods impatiently.

"The rebel's position is also under constant attack by the Risen at their rear, and desertions plague their ranks." The aide finished. "I daresay we'll be done with this idiocy by tomorrow."

_You said the exact same thing yesterday._ The captain thought idly. "So be it. What of the militia?"

"For untrained rabble they're doing quite well." A different aide (Aide B) reported. "Per your orders, our troops have mostly left the militia alone if possible, and as a result the peasants are focused almost exclusively on the Risen threat…incidentally, it might be beneficial to us if we were to lend them a hand, as the Risen are making short work of the militia, and panic is starting to affect their cohesion."

"There are still parts of the militia that side with the Rebels." Aide A reminded Aide B. "They won't receive us with anything resembling open arms."

"We just need to prove our good will." Aide B noted. "It's not as if we need to make a large show of it."

"And what of the Rebel's leader?" The garrison captain brought them back on track.

"Sir. Before dusk today we were able to separate the Princess of Chon'sin and her bodyguards from her main force." Aide A reported. "In what I can only describe as a stroke of brilliance, our forces were able to lure a substantial Risen force to surround them. Even if they survive through the night, they will be unable to resist us."

Aide B sighs. "Your optimism is worrying."

"And what of our newcomers?" The captain felt like he should replace one of his Aides with one that was less likely for news inflation. "And the ships that showed up this afternoon?"

"The Plegian troops on our shores have done nothing of importance, except maybe to attack our walls sporadically with spells." Aide B replied. "And the unknown naval fleet is moored far too far away to be of any interest."

_Really? _The guard captain frowns. "Why are the Ylisseans so far away?"

"No clue." Aide B shrugs. "I've tried counting their sails, but as far as I can see there are far too few sails compared to the number of hulls. Either they've suffered a severe injury getting here, or there is some hidden element to that fleet we are not aware of yet…whatever that may be."

"I have no love for that Rosannite fool," Aide A grumbles. "But his expertise as an admiral is peerless. I find it difficult to believe that any fleet would be able to best or outrun him, especially when Ignatius is focused on the offense."

"I share your opinion." Aide B nods. "And yet that fleet is here."

"But you do not believe they are capable?" The guard captain asks.

Aide B thinks for a moment then shakes his head. "Our coastal ballistae are reinforced, and they outrange the average ship ballistae by twofold. No matter what that fleet tries, we'll see it long before it happens…but we will task extra men on coastal defense just in case."

The guard captain couldn't really put it into words, but at some point after the debriefing there was a weight in his stomach that he could not shake, and that feeling only increased every time he mulled over what the unknown (but definitely Ylissean) fleet was capable of. He resolved to pay extra attention to the enemy ships just in case, as he had no desire to be taken by surprise.

…

…

[Next Day, Dawn]

…

…

Surprise! Not really.

The dawn saw a light fog on the ocean surface. It wasn't dense enough to obscure any ships, and the Valmese guard captain paid it no mind.

_Maybe I'm overthinking it. _He chided himself. _My job is to bring order to the city. It doesn't matter what those ships are capable of…if they want to take the city from me they will need to fight on my terms._

Shaking off his doubts, he gave the orders for his troops to proceed.

…

…

[Say'ri]

…

…

Say'ri has had a rough night so far.

First, she and her personal bodyguards (a squad of ten Swordmasters) were cut off from the main Rebel force when she had overextended against a Valmese mercenary squad. In retrospect, said mercenary squad was very likely a decoy, which meant that the Valmese could have had something up their sleeves, but the lucky appearance of a Risen cavalry squad put any potential ambushes on hold by the wholesale slaughter of literally everybody except for Say'ri's squad.

As it were, the Risen quickly and summarily overwhelmed the position with their numbers and cut Say'ri off from the rest of her army. With the Risen blocking her immediate approach and the militia being of questionable allegiance in the best of cases, she and her squad pushed to an abandoned house in the southeastern part of the city (if the ocean is south) with a swarm of Risen in tow.

She and her squad then spent the better part of the night fighting in said abandoned house to keep it from being overrun by said zombies. They did pretty well, all things considered. It was not possible for them to escape, but they were able to hold the fort, as it were…the Risen, while persistent, were eventually slowed down by the amount of corpses the girls piled at the door.

At roughly 0300 (so after about five hours of constant defensive combat) the situation took a sudden turn for the worse. A Risen General of incredible power showed up at their doorstop and proceeded to immediately skewer Say'ri's girls to the wall with overpowered lance thrusts. Fortunately, the incredible force of its attacks blew the walls of the stone house open and gave the rest of them time to escape.

Unfortunately, the house was still surrounded by Risen and the rest of Say'ri's bodyguards died buying enough time for Say'ri to escape by her lonesome.

It is now 0600. Say'ri had spent the rest of the night running from the rest of the Risen in the darkness, fighting to the best of her ability to stay alive while she searched for a way back to her forces.

_But at this point it seems unlikely that I can do so. _She thought. The latest Risen Mercenary lie re-dead at her feet with the snapped blade of her killing edge pinning it to the ground via the head. _I need to find another way around._

It's still too dark to see properly, and lighting a torch was definitely not going to help her.

Say'ri palms the hilt of her now broken Killing Edge. _This makes all three of my swords. _She sighs softly. _If I do not find supplies I will be finished here._

She gently drops the hilt onto the body of the Risen. _Without weapons, I will be unable to break through the Valmese lines. Should I attempt to make contact with the militia? _She ponders for a moment but ultimately shakes her head. _Their force is a loose coalition at best, and their ultimate loyalty is with their own homes. I have no bargaining power as I am now and they could simply choose to turn me over to the Valmese in exchange for peace._

She hears hooves, and ducks into a nearby alley just in case the darkness wasn't dark enough (and because people do carry torches).

_The wall is overrun with Risen. _She continues to think. _That leaves just the coastline…but even if I go to the ocean, what can I accomplish? _She tugs at her armor. _I can swim to safety, but what happens after that? What happens to our forces after that?_

She then notices the barest hint of torchlight turning around the corner. _Oh. _She then realizes. _I forgot to move the corpse._

…

The newcomer was a militia cavalier, with three armor knights in his entourage.

"You're sure she went this way?" One of the armor knights asks.

"Yeah." The cavalier grins. He actually had no idea where Say'ri went (or what Say'ri looked like, or if the girl they were after was Say'ri at all) but as far as he was concerned he could make good money leading troops through the city streets, and if things go south for him (like, say, they find out that he was bullshitting) then he could always send them 'accidentally' into the path of oncoming Risen.

Either way, the four of them come upon the re-dead Risen and the blade, and they raise their torches to get a better view of the surroundings.

"Whoa." The cavalier whistled when it was certain they were not in any danger of being attacked. "Think she's still around here?"

"She shouldn't be too dangerous if she is." One of the armor knights muttered. "Alright, let's keep our eyes open."

"The back alleys here all lead back to this main street." The cavalier noted. "She'll need to show up at some point."

_That's correct. _Say'ri thought, hidden in the back alley and out of sight. _So I need to at least take out the horseman to escape. _She took a small breath. _There's no getting around it._

"Whoa!" The armor knight overwatching the street she was hidden in raised his lance in preparation as Say'ri shot out from the darkness like an arrow.

He stabs.

Say'ri, taking care not to stare into the torches to preserve what little night vision she had, dodges it just fine.

She sidesteps him and barrels toward the cavalier, who draws his sword in response.

The cavalier swings downward as Say'ri reaches him, and misses as Say'ri dives underneath the Cavalier and grabs the broken blade of her killing edge.

She then twists and lodges the blade with an upward thrust into the horse's belly.

"Shit! Get her!" One of the other armor knights yells and throws his spear at her.

Say'ri dives out of the way and it strikes the cavalier's horse in the rear (poor horse). The horse tosses its rider off of its back in shock (and exceptional pain) as Say'ri yanks the spear from its flank.

She then felt a stab of pain as the cavalier (now on the ground and in shock) makes a wild swing for her leg. It didn't cut deep, but her mobility was definitely hampered.

In response she stabbed him in the face, completely hampering his ability to remain alive.

"Send up the flares!" An armor knight roared and moved to block Say'ri's path to the coast.

_I don't have the time for this. _Say'ri thought and moves in against one of the armor knights. The armor knight raises his shield in preparation, and then immediately feels a set of five strikes on his armor blow him back.

_Damn, too shallow. _Say'ri parries the spear of another armor knight and smacks her new attacker in the face with her spear shaft. She then slammed said shaft into the armor knight's shins with a golf swing motion and dropped him to the ground.

Unfortunately the armor of her opponent claimed her spear during his fall with his mass and the spear shattered under his weight, leaving just a broken piece of wood in her hands.

Say'ri then felt the glow on her back of the flare the third armor knight shot into the air. _Out of time. I need to go, now. _She rushes at the first armor knight, who stabs at her but misses. With a well-aimed tackle at the shield of the knight, she took advantage of the knight's poor posture and staggered her enemy.

The knight fell on her rear, and Say'ri made her escape.

"Ah…hell. Ow." The 2nd knight on the ground groans and slowly gets back on his feet. "You ok over there, sis?"

"Yeah." The first knight gets back on her feet. "She's even better than rumored."

"Better or not, we need to go after her." The third knight reminded the two. "Now let's go."

"What about him?" The first knight points to the dead cavalier.

"He's already dead. Ignore him." The third knight snaps. "That idiot was going to betray us anyway."

And thus the three of them continued to chase after the escaped princess.

Fortunately, due to the dim lighting they didn't see the trail of blood turn down a side alley and abruptly stop.

_Whew. _Say'ri thought as she tore pieces of her clothing to bandage her hand and leg. _This gives me some time. _When she finished her ad-hoc first aid she hurried towards the coast.

…

…

[City, Dawn]

…

…

The morning was much like the rest. Regardless of the appearance of the unknown navy the day before, the Rebel forces continued to engage the Valmese troops around the northern section of the town while fending off increasingly aggressive attacks from the Risen and the militia.

The Valmese were pushing primarily against the Rebels, while fending off sporadic attacks from panicked militia members as necessary.

And the militia (despite being referred to as a coherent group) is functionally a loose coalition of several bands of men technically operating under the same flag of protecting the city. What constituted "protecting the city" thus meant different things to different groups, and thus they are stuck fighting literally everybody.

And last but far from least, the newcomer fleet sailed towards the coastline, unseen by anyone except the Valmese coast guard…which is like everybody who's looking towards the coastline, so they're not really unseen, but eh.

…

[1st Person Camera]

…

"I find it difficult to believe that the enemy will not see us." Maribelle notes with disbelief and worry. "Nor our landing ships on the water."

I don't really blame her. "They're somewhat cloaked. If we do our jobs right then the boats will be just fine." The cloaking is the one we use on the Pegasus Knights—that is, they rely on the enemy not paying attention—but with something as large as a ship it doesn't work too well.

"Our jobs?" Maribelle sounds a little bit worried (and offended). "Are you forgetting who you have on board?"

I have a squishy healer. "I know, I know…I won't do any serious combat maneuvers if you hold on tight."

"That's not what I mean!" Maribelle is offended.

Hehehe.

_She's sitting in front of us and thus the active mind can't see, but she rolls her eyes. _"Your sense of humor is as baffling as ever."

I shrug, as Kyle goes into an almost vertical dive much to (his riding buddy) Lissa's delight. Namely, her delighted screaming as they rocket down to the ocean at full afterburners. At least I think its screams of delight…it's a tad hard to tell at that volume level.

_So why is Maribelle riding with us?_

Robin's orders. Since we're attacking a city and we don't really know the terrain, she figured that having flying heal-buses would be the most efficient way of keeping everyone alive. Of course, there's the limitation of how many free flyers we actually have (hint: not many) and how many good healers we actually have (like, four).

The rest of the healers are good (in a strict healing capacity) but none of them are used to the idea of flying…or taking fire.

_Not saying they can't take a hit, they're just far less skilled at keeping their head if targeted._

'nyways, Maribelle's with us, Lissa's with NPC Kyle, Morgan's with Cherche, and Brady's with one of Cherche's wingmen.

"Ok, all units, listen up." I say into the radio as we approach the shoreline. "Our assault ships are inbound to the enemy shore line, our objective is to eliminate the Valmese anti-ship weapons to make the ground pounders land safely…I don't want to lose a boat just because we were careless. Blackbirds, how does it look down there?"

"Blackbird one, I see a line of ballistae on the enemy coast." I see the Blackbirds high above us…though the grounds are misty, the sky is clear. "It doesn't look like they're busy."

In other words, they'll definitely see us. "Relay message to fleet: Destroyers are to move into bombardment range, Landing ships approach at max speed."

"How many landing ships do we have?" Maribelle wonders.

"We have enough for about 200 men." I reply off radio. "All the more reason to ensure that every last one of them makes it to shore."

"Are they going to be alright down there?" She peers down and immediately draws back…we're pretty high up.

_She adorably shrinks into us a little._

"If we do our jobs right, they will be." I turn my radio on again. "Alright, girls…and boys. You are all hereby cleared to assault the city. Commence operation!"

"About time." Halloween One aims her anti-ground cannon. "Firing! Stay out of my line!"

_She's using her medium cannon, which has three barrels and fires in fast, three-round bursts. It reloads with the speed of molasses though._

Making fast firing weapons that have power with weight and forging limitations is incredibly hard.

"Strafing the ballistae. Tomcats, drop bombs on my signal." Halloween two declares.

_She's using the Thor anti-ground cannon, which is the closest thing we have to a military middle finger._

It's a railgun built with the extenders from the last war…the same extenders that caught on fire after a few shots from overheating.

"Over there!" Maribelle points to our right, almost straight forward. We follow her arm and see incoming Pegasus knights. Are they Valmese? They don't feel Valmese. Their flying is too stiff to be human, even.

"Wyvern flight, on me, we're engaging the air elements." I pull out my airman rifle and pull Maribelle closer.

"Hey!" She's not exactly happy about that.

_She's not exactly unhappy about that either._

She's stopping us from using the poleaxe, so she gets a prolonged hug as a penalty. Fair's fair.

…

[3rd Person Camera]

…

Since the beginning of the civil war within the city, the Valmese coast guard fulfilled the role of being…uh, well, coast guards. That is, they guarded the coast against any land based incursions and made sure the Valmese garrison wasn't flanked from the sea.

Thus, they were never overly concerned with any ships that might appear on the horizon…and why should they be? The only ships that would show up right now would be Valmese warships.

Which is why, today, they spent extra attention waiting for the unknown ships to approach the city. It was simply too interesting to do otherwise.

Which is also why everybody jumped in surprise when one of the ballistae suddenly shattered and showered its operators with chips of wood.

The lieutenant in charge snapped out of his confusion first. "Attack! We're under attack!"

A second ballistae exploded while catching on fire.

"Archers! Get the archers! Everybody get under cover!" The lieutenant commanded as a flurry of somethings impacted the land around him, breaking off pieces of the stone and kicking up dirt.

And then the sky caught on fire.

"HOLY dear Naga" The lieutenant said as he dove into an open door. He twisted quickly to see what could only be burning oil splash onto the ground and his soldiers.

"Archers, find an open window and prepare to take them down." The lieutenant said shakily, willing himself to ignore the hissing of the fire and the screaming of his men. "Kill every last one of them!"

One of the Snipers, ballsy as he is, complied by rushing up a ladder (they were hiding in a small warehouse) and opened a window.

He then looked in confusion as a cylinder sailed into the room, where it struck the ground, bounced, spun, rolled, and came to a stop at the Lieutenant's feet.

The Lieutenant and the twenty-some odd soldiers stared at the cylinder. They then heard an odd hissing from it.

The warehouse went up in flames a few seconds later.

…

[Landing Ships]

…

"Wow, that's really something, alright." Robin mutters to herself as she surveyed the damage done to the Valmese coastline. "Everything's on fire."

The initial strike by the Halloweens sent the Valmese troops running, and the abandoned ballistae were then summarily bombed by the Pegasus Knight squadrons and uniformly set ablaze.

"We're coming up to the coast in about a minute." The sailor in charge of steering the ship reported.

"Already? This thing's fast." Robin sat back down. "I thought we had some more time."

"We did too." The sailor grins. "But I love a fast ship…yo, Daniel. You ready over there?"

Daniel, the NPC Sniper in charge of the autocannon on the boat (the same kind used by the ships for anti-air purposes) flashed a thumbs-up.

"Ok…Everybody hold on to something." The sailor said.

Everybody looked around and realized there really wasn't anything to hold on _to_.

…

[Air]

…

Ash ducked underneath a spear thrust (pushing Maribelle down with him) and shot the offending Pegasus Knight in the stomach.

"And here I thought we were up against Valmese Knights." Ash grumbles while the Risen Pegasus Knight falls to the ground and splatter against a roof. "Sorry about that, Maribelle."

"I'm almost inclined to believe you are doing it on purpose." Maribelle mutters, clutching Magna's reins and Ash's arm (wrapped in front of her) tightly.

"I don't have a lot of mobility with an extra rider." Ash says as an apology. "Never installed the extra bracings to stop a non-flyer from falling off."

"So you say." Maribelle sniffs. "Your left."

Magna banks right and pulls up sharply, leaving the javelin thrown at him in the dust. He then quickly banked to his left so Ash could get a clear shot, and Ash quickly dispatched the attacking Risen with a shot to the head.

"Boss, it looks like the ships have landed." Morgan reports in between him burning an entire Fire book to carpet the land beneath him in spells. "Should we go as well?"

"Yeah, good call." Ash replies, reloading his rifle (arm still in front of Maribelle and invading the hell out of her personal space). "All units with suppression weapons on me, we're clearing the ship landing zone." He then circled around in a wide circle to find the best path of approach that wouldn't result in him getting shot and downed by arrows. "This is Condor Lead to Assault squad, we'll be flying a suppression mission over your heads, watch your firing angles."

"Assault Squad, roger." Robin replies. "Don't hit us."

…

The landing ships, constructed basically like boxes (with the bridge and gun mounted on the back) rammed their heads somewhat gently against the stone docks of the city.

_'Constructed' is a wrong term. They were large freshwater fishing boats acquired and given a layer of armor, making them (almost total) retrofits, like the Destroyers._

"Ow." Robin rubs her head. Her ship had lurched her forward and she hit her head against the back of the guy in front of her. "So that's why Ash told us to keep our weapons on the deck."

Her sword was pressed against the floor (by her hand) and thus did not move.

Upon seeing the Risen swarming around on the docks, the boat captain yelled "Throw the ropes! Tie us down!" while the sniper in charge of the gun flashed a maniacal grin and aimed his autocannon.

The other boats did the same as Ash and his flight of suppressing Pegasus Knights soared over head.

Through the combination of the autocannons, the shrapnel bombs, and very liberal applications of javelins and magic, the dock area was cleared in record time.

"Alright, disembark and form into your combat groups!" Robin yells, clambering off of her ship first (the landing ship was barely higher than the dock piers) and blinking in surprise at the suddenly vanishing Risen corpses. "Ok, didn't expect that." She mutters.

The rest of her advance troops (mostly Feroxi units) disembarked as quickly as they could, assembling into their small squads once they reached dry land.

Once all of their cargo was unloaded, the landing boats untied themselves from the docks and returned to load the second wave of troops.

"Looks good so far." Robin breathes…and like clockwork, Risen popped out from behind walls and corners. "God damn it. Look alive! We have company!"

Robin then heard Ash's voice over her radio. "Condor to Robin, Halloween is over your heads; call them when you need it."

"Thanks, Ash." Robin replies quickly as her men hurry and prepare to receive the rampaging, incoming Risen. "Halloween, watch for my flares for attack points."

"I hear ya, Robin." Halloween One replies. "Just tell us who you want dead."

Robin fires a flare over the main street going from their position to the gate leading out of the city, seconds before the Risen Mercenaries leading the pack crash into her Fighters.

…

"I see it, engaging now." Halloween one takes aim with the Thor. "Brace."

"Got it." Her rider (responsible for keeping the Pegasus flying straight) pumped her magical power into the cruise engines.

"Firing." Halloween One pressed the trigger.

…

Robin, distracted by blasting a Risen into the air with her wind magic, didn't see the sudden gout of purple smoke in the back of the Risen crowd.

A certain black haired Swordmaster hiding amongst the attics of houses within the combat zone did see, however, and her shock very nearly blew her cover.

"What manner of weapons are those?" She whispered from her hiding spot, watching as the Risen swarm becomes held in position along the wide city streets before a barrage of something (she's not really looking _up_) wiped out swaths of the Risen. "It's almost like music." She marvels at how consistent the explosions were.

…

The consistency of the explosion was due to the Halloweens losing their firing angle.

"I hate these buildings." Halloween Two grumbles, as their flight path put another roof between her and her bombardment target. "Can we go higher?"

"Your aim sucks if we go higher." Her flight partner quips. "So suck it up. Can you use the medium guns?"

"Too many targets, too little ammo." Halloween Two replies grumpily. "These things aren't light, after all." She loads one of the heavy anti-mob munitions into the Thor. "Flying in circles suck; find a better pattern."

"Yeah, yeah." The flight partner, sitting behind her partner, rolls her eyes.

_You'd think the person in charge of flying would be up front._

The guns need the leg space.

…

The battle lasted for twenty minutes.

With the assistance of the occasional aerial carpet bombing (kinda) the initial swath of Risen were cleared out and the Feroxi troops were able to establish a defensive perimeter around the docks.

"Robin to A…er, Condor." Robin says as she does a quick inspection of the makeshift defenses of carts, boxes, and wooden prefabricated palisades brought from the boarding ships. "We've set up a…beach head position. Is this good enough for you?"

Ash, soaring overhead, banks low to do a pass over the defenses. "Yeah, looks good for now. Our next objective should be the gate itself; we need to lock the damn Risen out of the city."

"I don't think that'll be enough to stop them." Robin replies. "More of them incoming." She reminds her archers as small groups of Risen continue to approach the barricades. "Can't you just destroy the gate entirely?"

"Our weapons don't have that kind of penetration power." Ash replies. "Shit." He banks hard to avoid a head on collision with a Risen Pegasus Knight before twisting and shooting said knight in the back. "The Destroyers are five minutes out, but you're cleared for incursions into the city at your leisure."

"You don't think we can finish this one quickly, do you?" Robin asks while rallying some mages around her.

Ash's response sounded more than just a little bit annoyed. "A city this size, four combat factions fighting a clusterfuck of an urban war, and zombies raining from the sky? No, we're gonna be here for a week, at least."

"We'll be done in two days." Robin corrects him firmly. "Chrom, this site is yours."

"Of course." Chrom responds after cleaving a Risen in half. "Good hunting, Robin."

Robin's response is to clean the main street down to the gate with a high-powered Thoron.

…

"Condor to flight." Ash says once Robin starts making headway towards the northern gate (where the Risen were coming from). "I have some new assignments for you girls. Wyvern Squadrons are to continue maintaining aerial superiority. Pegasus Squadrons are to divide into two provisional groups: Group Alpha will continue to bombard ground targets and provide combat support as necessary, and Group Beta will act as aerial recon for the advancing ground forces. I'll leave the actual squadron designations to you guys."

He hears a chorus of acknowledgements.

"Group B, keep your eyes peeled on the side streets and windows of the city; make sure our ground forces are not ambushed."

"What about us?" Halloween One demanded.

"Halloween is to continue providing close air support for our attacking units…watch for Robin's flares. Blackbirds, continue monitoring the combat theatre, and alert us if the other factions start acting up."

"Loki here," Cynthia adds in. "I'll rejoin d-Chrom and keep the entry point safe."

"Condor rogers. Good hunting, Loki."

"Hey!" Severa butts in on the radio. "We're only Loki if we fight together, you know."

"Eeh?!" Cynthia is shocked. "You're not coming?"

"I'm going with Robin and the advance forces. Sitting around just isn't me." Severa's sneer was very much audible.

"Yeah? W-well…I'm going too!"

"Cynthia, stick to the camp." Ash chides her. "We're in a war zone. The two of you can fight it out after we're done."

"Roger that." Severa answers as Cynthia (grumbling) swoops low towards Robin, letting Severa jump off and land on a Risen to join the front lines immediately.

"You're no fun, boss. No fun at all." Cynthia pouts, pulling up and turning to return to camp.

…

[Valmese Garrison]

…

The garrison captain was pleasantly surprised. "They're doing what?"

"They're attacking the Risen." His scout reported. "Clear on the other side of town."

When he heard that the coastal defenders suffered heavy casualties and lost every last one of their shore ballistae, the garrison captain was worried that the newcomers would storm and attack his position: while the Valm position was heavily secured in the city, the defenses around the coast (once the ballistae were wiped out) were akin to wet newspaper.

The Allied forces' strategy to go after the Risen first gave him time to reinforce, and he was inwardly thankful…but his goal was to keep the city, not merely to keep his position.

He made a decision. "Alert our cavalry: converge on the newcomers' position. Travel on the side paths and keep themselves hidden from the skies…I won't be surprised if those flyers of theirs are acting as the eyes of the army."

…

The Valmese cavalry up to this point has seen little use, and it was largely due to a strange catch-22 of the current combat situation. The problem was as thus: the wide, main street that connected the town center to each gate (thus most suited for cavalry) had numerous side streets where spearmen could hide and pop out when least expected. The Valm cavalry thus can't charge down the main street if the flanks aren't secure, and they can't go down the side street as cavalry due to taking too much room…and if the side streets were secured by the Valmese infantry then the foe they happen to be fighting at the time would withdraw back to their controlled territory, making any charge useless to begin with.

Moreover, the cavalry was only needed in the center of the city: the civilians and militia along the coastal part of town were, at the very least, apathetic to Valmese forces, and thus there was never a reason to devote the troops to hold those sections of the town.

_This was more of a good judgment call by the garrison commander than Valmese battle doctrine: he figured that being nice to the people would be better in the long run. The payoff, of course, is that the coastal area required less guarding since the Valm-friendly forces act as a buffer for the less friendly center city militia forces._

Thus, right now, the Valmese force of Cavaliers and Great Knights could travel quickly while avoiding detection through the vacant back streets along the coastal area, all the while waiting for the right moment to emerge onto the large, flat port area so they can run down their targets with their favorite cavalry charge.

…

The garrison commander's assumption of the Pegasus Knights acting as the eyes of the enemy was right on the money.

"Blackbird Two to Landing Zone, I have a report."

Chrom waited for a second before realizing that he was technically Landing Zone right now. "Uh, right. What's your report?"

"A detachment of Valmese Cavalry has disappeared from their reserves." Blackbird Two responded. "We don't see them anywhere."

He thought for a moment. "So they could be coming here?"

"Affirmative."

_That's a problem. _Chrom frowned. "Ok, I understand. Thank you."

"Blackbird Two, out."

"Robin, did you hear that?" Chrom asks for advice.

Robin was in the middle of tearing through her batch of Risen Myrmidons. "Yeah, I heard. We brought a lot of stakes and spears, have the men make a defensive line along the entryways. Ash?"

"Halloween flight, fall back and prepare to defend the landing point." Ash didn't really have anything to do. The Risen air force was few in number and Cherche+Morgan was a flying fortress taking all of his kills. "Blackbirds, relay message to Akatsuki and Hibiki. Have them prepare their ground assault weapons and prepare to sweep the coastline."

"Blackbird One, roger."

…

The Valmese plan to surprise the Allied Forces thus fell flat on its face…not much you can do when the other side has the ability to relay information almost immediately.

"I didn't expect them to get ready so quickly." The cavalry commander mutters. "It's quite impressive."

"It doesn't look like they have that many men." His Lieutenant points out. "If we strike now we should be able to break through that defense before they can react."

"Given their reaction time even before they knew we were coming, they should have some extra defenses already." His commander notes as he peers at the rows of lances and spears erected to point in his direction. "What do you think of their defenses, Alan?"

NPC Alan, his Dark Knight Lieutenant, pushed up his honestly very oddly designed six-eye visor. "They shouldn't have much behind those spears. If I had to guess, their defense is centered around having outside troops of some sort."

"So the quicker we mix ourselves up with their units, the better." The commander summarizes. "Alright, we're going in. All units, charge!"

…

"Oh hell no!" Cynthia, watching over the defensive line, exclaims. "Dad! They're coming from the left side!"

Chrom wheeled to see the enemy cavalry charge towards the left barricades. "Prepare to defend!" He roars.

I should take this moment to describe the defenses of the landing point.

In a nutshell, it has two layers of defenses (hastily put up to give the good guys a terrain advantage against the Risen and lightly armed infantry): the inner barricade that acts as the final line of defense for the port areas and the future boarding zone for the ships, and the outer barricade that utilizes the walls of the nearest houses to act as a defensive kill zone for any would-be incoming attackers. The outer wall thus has three exits: one that extends out to the coastline (left side), one that goes to the main street and thus the northern gate (center side), and one that goes out west and also goes to the northern gate, but along the city wall instead (right side).

The problem right now is that the kill zone only exists as a theory: the barricades were nowhere near tough enough to weather a cavalry charge and the lances, though erected, were not braced onto anything remotely resembling weight.

Basically it was a defense that relied on crossing fingers and going "please don't actually hit us."

Naturally, that kind of strategy doesn't really work when the enemies are intent on making said hit, and the Valmese Heavy cavalry barreled through the front line defenses and scattered the carts and boxes and whatever every which way before turning and charging out of the northern gate (also scattering everywhere and everything and making a mess of the rest).

In retaliation, the Feroxi army made sure to stay clear of the charge the best they could and pelted the offending cavalry with missiles.

"As I thought: no defenses at all." The Valm commander sneered. "Turnabout! We'll use the side alleys to form a second charge! Leave no one alive!"

Unfortunately for him, he decided to form his second charge along the coastline again (as it had the least obstructions and thus the greatest charging power) and this time he noticed a pair of ships sailing closer (despite not having any sails) at an incredibly fast pace.

"Looks like they have backup." NPC Alan said. "Those ships give me a bad feeling."

The commander struggled internally for a moment between what he knew of ship to shore weaponry and what he was willing to risk given the mysterious nature of these new ships. "Alright, new plan, we'll assault them from the main street instead."

"It's just a few ballistae, what's the harm?" One of his men wondered.

"Their strategist planned to put just two ships there." NPC Alan replied. "If that says anything about him, it's that he has great faith in his ships. It's not worth dying just because we were carelessly brave."

With that, the cavalry disappeared into the side alleys again, out of the line of fire of the Destroyers.

…

"They're probably coming back onto the main street." Cynthia says to her radio. "Alpha squadron, I need some bombs."

"Alpha, we hear you. We're lining up for a bombing run, just say the word." Rafale One replies, her squadron of twenty Pegasus Knights circling over the camp.

"Dad, get the men ready for a charge." Cynthia then says. "When we're done with our run, come and smack 'em in the face."

"Uh…sure." Chrom replies and quickly rallies the men. "You do this often?"

"It used to be Bossman's favorite strategy, though we're using different stuff now." Cynthia replies. "Sev!"

"Yeah, yeah, I hear you." Severa replies grumpily, with a squad of roughly ten Fighters in tow. "We're ready whenever."

"Ok…" Cynthia banks and circles over the main street as the Valmese cavalry pours in and form into a charging line (while still moving relatively quickly). "Ok…now!"

…

The Valmese Cavalry, while forming up for a charge, saw the most peculiar thing: a flight of Pegasus Knights few straight over their heads at a high speed. If the Valm commander didn't know better, he would've sworn that these were Wyverns instead.

Either way, the Pegasus Knights zoomed over their heads, and most of the Valmese men looked up in confusion.

"The hell was that all about?" NPC Alan muttered…when he heard something that sounded like shattering…before he heard something small and sharp impact against his armor.

All around him the Valmese cavalry felt small metallic shrapnel strike their armor, and the lighter cavaliers (and a few Valkryies) were torn to pieces and killed on the spot. The rest of the Heavy Knights and few Dark Knights were more or less fine…their horses a little beaten up, but otherwise fine.

_The fragmentation warheads weren't accelerated enough to deal the damage we wanted._

"The hell was that all about?" NPC Alan wondered again, twisting his head to follow the Pegasus Knights that seem to be turning around for another pass. "Should we hide?"

"Press onward. They can't attack us if we're within their lines." His commander replied, readying for a charge…before seeing two more Pegasus Knights hover in front of them. "What now?!" He demanded.

In response, the Paladin next to him was blown clean off of his horse.

Well, actually, the Paladin next to him was still on the horse. The horse itself was blown off of its hooves and crushed its rider when the pair fell.

"The hell was that?!" Alan demanded, urging his horse onwards. "Charge! Charge! Get to the enemy lines!"

Their cavalry (roughly 150 in all) rouse themselves and rush onwards, but it was a little bit too late. The land in front of them and all around exploded with bits of rock and metal as whatever the Pegasus Knights were using struck into their lines and onto the paved road beneath their feet.

The Pegasus Knights that had made the first sweep now made it back, and made another sweep over their heads. This time, the munitions they dropped onto the head of said horsemen were far more effective, and the Valmese cavalry found themselves unable to charge forward.

And then, the bombardment stopped.

The Valmese cavalry took a moment to catch their breath…

And then were immediately beset by Feroxi Axemen, with Chrom at their head.

"Oh shit!" NPC Alan swore as the commander was run through by Chrom's silver sword (he disliked using the Falchion on humans). "Draw swords! Swords!" One of his Paladins complied and drew his sword against Chrom. Chrom cut the sword in half along with the man's upper body. "Ok, fuck that then. Retreat! Retreat!"

The rest of his men, still shocked, turn their steeds around to retreat down the main street (the side streets obliterated from their minds through panic) and saw a small contingent of Fighters led by a Mercenary girl.

"Break through them!" NPC Alan commanded, figuring that the small group would be much less resistance than the Fighters behind him.

Unfortunately for them they were up against Severa.

She activated one of her Dagger bits and shot it with all of her magical prowess into the legs of Alan's horse, shearing it off and causing the horse to stumble and throw NPC Alan off. Capitalizing on the momentum of Alan falling off his horse, Severa took her steel sword and broke it in Alan's armored body with a thrust, entirely arresting the far from minute momentum of the freshly dead Corpse with her attack.

"Surrender." Severa demands coldly as she tosses the broken sword and body combo and reached for a spare blade.

Seeing the red-haired twintails kill someone literally three times her weight and toss him aside like a ragdoll, the remainder of the Valmese horsemen dropped their weapons and dismounted in one hell of a hurry.

"Luna to Condor, we've neutralized the cavalry threat." Severa says to her radio as Chrom catches up with his men. "Taking the survivors to camp now."

"Roger that, Luna." Ash says. "Good work." He then goes off radio. "Think they need you at the front lines yet?" He asks Mirabelle.

Mirabelle huffs. "I'm surprised they haven't asked already…Robin's losing her touch. Descend at the end of the front lines."

"Aye aye." Ash banked towards Robin's troops.

…

Robin's forces were currently hacking away at the Risen on their way towards the gate. Due to her strategies and careful rotation of troops, Feroxi losses were kept at a minimum while they overwhelmed small pockets of Risen.

They were quickly running out of steam, however, as the Risen guarding the gate were of a much higher quality than the rest.

"Lady Robin, what should we do?" One of the Feroxi Fighters asks her.

Robin holds up a finger to quiet him, as she was staring daggers at the gate trying to find some point of entry against the Risen Troops that kept the gate from their grasp. Her other hand was holding a steadily reddening cloth to side.

_Screw up like that again and we'll all be in a lot of trouble. _Robin reminded herself.

She had overextended during the last leg towards the gate and got ambushed by a squad of Snipers while trying to support a few Fighters. While her wind magic blocked most of the arrows fired at them it did let one through.

_The gate's held by Warriors, and it's being covered by Risen archers on the walls. _Robin tallies in her mind. _The gate itself also leads up to the walls, so if I want to clear the archers then the only way to do so is to capture the gatehouse_…_I could go around, but that takes time and puts us under unnecessary fire._

"Lady!" One of the Fighters yells in alarm.

Robin swaps a Sniper's aimed arrow out of the sky with her sword (wreathed in wind magic). "It's not a problem if I see it."

_Our cover position behind the houses and carts lend us no real advantage, and our approach will cause the loss of many men. _Robin frowns. _I don't have a choice here, do I?_

"Looks like you could use a little help." She hears Ash behind her, and turns to see Magna land on the ground. "Maribelle?"

"Let me see that." Maribelle pulls out a heal staff and quickly gets to work on Robin's injury. "You should ask us for help more often, Robin." She chides.

Robin smiles in response. "Thought about it, but we're pretty short on manpower right now as it is; Ash, how long until the Cavalry can move with their part of the plan?"

"Uh…" Ash does some mental calculating. "A long time."

"Plenty then." Robin mutters. "Now all I need is a way to blast through those gates."

Ash glances at the gate and at the archers on the walls. "My flight is on its way home to re-arm. You could wait until they come back."

"No guarantee we take the walls if they come, plus I don't like using flyers against arrows." Robin swats another arrow. "We absolutely need the walls for Virion's squad for the next part of the operation."

Ash shakes his head in despair. "You're a touch too stubborn about this." He then pulls out a small pocket spellbook, one designed to carry exactly one spell.

"What do you have there?" Robin asks, not just a little curious. Maribelle huffs in annoyance and Robin dutifully stop moving, so as to give Maribelle less work.

Ash begins to concentrate his magic power. "I figured that just have overpowered weapons wasn't broken enough."

Everyone who heard him had no idea what he was talking about.

"Well, just wait and see." Ash grins. "Ok…and…discharge."

A ball of light formed in his hand and he tossed it casually towards the gate, where it floated in the air for a little bit, then exploded.

After that, nothing happened.

"Even the greatest mages fail a spell sometimes." Robin says reassuringly.

"Eh…" Ash sticks his arm out of cover and waves it up and down. "I say it worked, let's see." He then takes a bold step out, in plain sight of the Risen Snipers.

"Hey!" Robin hisses…and then is a little bit confused by the lack of incoming fire aiming to taking Ash's head off.

"Yeah, I say it worked." Ash mutters. "C'mon, we have our window of opportunity. Keep yourselves quiet now, the spell only works on vision."

Maribelle narrows her eyes suspiciously. "What…what did you do?"

"Screen cover." Ash replies softly. "I figured abusing the ability to control vision was worth capitalizing on. The spell creates a replica image and projects it onto a magical screen, so right now the Risen are looking at an image of the things we're hiding behind."

Robin was unconvinced. "But the Risen-" didn't rely solely on vision. Ash held up a hand to cut her short though.

"Yeah, I know." Ash sighs. "It's a bit of a gamble, but it's paying off; now c'mon, we need to charge the position before the spell wears off."

The Fighters ready their axes and charge as quietly as possible towards the gates.

"Spell is off in 3…2…1…" Ash mutters as he, Robin, and Maribelle ready spells in their hands. "Now!"

The air in front of them seemingly disintegrates and shatters, signaling the loss of the spell cover. The Risen react to the charging soldiers by growling.

The charging soldiers roar louder as the three magic users leading the charge shoot everything they prepared at the gates, letting the soldiers engage at melee range safely enough.

_The Risen archers were still shooting, but at the very least the good guys weren't being shot at while making the approach._

"On the walls!" Robin yells, clearing the path to a staircase. "Kill those archers!"

"On it!" Ash responds, dodging the spear of a General on defense to clamber up the staircase. "I really shouldn't be doing ground ops." He grumbles as he begins to snipe archers from the safety of the gatehouse. "Watch my back, will ya?"

"Aye, sir." The handful of Fighters that followed him replied readily.

…

…

[Base Camp]

…

…

By now, the Enterprise and the rest of the escorted transports have pulled into the docks. The Enterprise, being a Carrier much larger than the usual boat, required a pier to be demolished to make room for the ship itself (and even then it stuck out like a poorly parked car).

But the attention wasn't really focused on the massive ship as supplies get unloaded into the campsite. Instead, it was focused on the black-haired woman approaching the camp carefully. Stealthily.

Actually nobody really noticed her at first since her stealth is pretty good, but Cynthia is in the sky and she's a bit of a loudmouth, so Say'ri's stealth became non-existent the instant Cynthia flew over her and went "Hi!" At the top of her lungs.

"Who are you?" One of the guards rudely asks as Say'ri sheepishly walks to the camp sans sneaking.

She gives a small bow. "I am Say'ri, the princess of Chon'sin. I wish to speak to your general."

The guard glanced at Noire, who was the captain on guard duty (much to her terror).

Noire was, fortunately, terrified of people and not protocol. "Um…Guardian to Condor."

"Condor, I'm a little busy here." Ash replies, still busy mopping up the wall. (The battle had progressed favorably). "What is it?"

"There's a Princess of Chon'sin here, and she wants to see…um…one of you."

Say'ri looked a bit confused at the girl in front of her, who had a hand to her ear and was apparently speaking to nobody in particular…and receiving a response.

"Geez, really?" Ash was more surprised than annoyed. "Condor to Enterprise, get Emmeryn down here."

"As you wish." Ninya replies and goes off radio. "Exalt, there's a princess waiting to see you."

"It's not Lissa, is it?" Emmeryn smiles. "Lead the way."

…

…

[Valmese Camp]

…

…

Bad news.

"This isn't a joke, messenger."

"I can assure you it isn't, sir. The cavalry detachment sent to fight the newcomers was killed to a man."

The aide was only slightly lying (he saw some of the cavalry be taken captive) but figured a little embellishment was fair game right now.

The guard captain fumed. With the loss of the cavalry their numbers were stretched further. At no point did he expect an easy fight against the unknowns but it never occurred to him that the entire cavalry would be destroyed…and before noon, too. Nobody can blame him, as the term 'aerial saturation bombing' doesn't currently exist in the current military lexicon.

"What do we do?" One of his council asked unnecessarily.

"We reinforce the coastal position." A tactician (assigned to said coastal position) snapped. "With the loss of our cavalry the dock area is now entirely clear for them; I won't be surprised if they attacked us in conjunction with the rebels."

"Alert the men." The guard captain suddenly said. "Get any unit we can spare and prepare to attack."

"Sir…" His second in command wasn't too happy about it.

"Don't worry." The guard captain said reassuringly. "I have a plan."

…

…

[Day 1, 1600]

…

…

By now, the Northern Gate was under allied control, and Robin had sent Virion and Vaike (along with some archers) to fortify the position. Given that Virion was a capable commander in his own right (so long as he was on the defense) and Vaike was tagging along, Robin returned to the camp with Ash.

_Maribelle stayed behind to do her duties as a healer…and to bust a few heads as a Valkryie._

"So…" Ash starts after the introductions. "What can we do for you, Princess Say'ri?"

"Just Say'ri is fine, Sir Ash." Say'ri replies courteously. "I would like to request that this army lend its power to our rebellion against Valm, and its king Walhart."

Given that the entire reason Ash built his army was to fight Walhart, he had no objections.

Robin, however… "Well, we _are _here to fight Walhart, but…" she glances at Emmeryn, and at Chrom.

"Any enemy of Walhart is a friend of ours." Chrom says readily.

"Sure, but is the rebellion cohesive?" Robin scratches her head. "This has been bothering me for a while. It seems like the battle in the city hosts four parties, us being one of them. I'm not going to engage if I don't know who my enemies are."

"That's…" Say'ri hesitates. "I can assure you that my troops, at least, will be loyal. The citizenry have taken up arms and are fighting, but they as a group care only for the safety of their city and families."

"Can't blame them for that." Robin mutters. "Emmeryn?"

"We will offer them assistance for this battle first, and then we can talk about the future." Emmeryn then, to the surprise of quite a few people, looks to Ash. "Is that acceptable?"

As far as most people were concerned Ash was a lower ranking officer…even if he was effectively bankrolling the entire operation.

Ash himself was pretty surprised too. "Uh, yeah. That sounds good."

"Pardon me." Say'ri turns to him. "You look like a man of Chon'sin. Did you…" She stops when Ash holds up a hand.

"Outrealmer, not…" He was about to say Faux-Japanese but decided it didn't make any sense. "well, Outrealmer."

"I see…" Say'ri nods politely. "I assumed wrongly. Had you been a man of Chon'sin I would've desired to have you in my court."

_Surprised muttering from the NPCs in the tent._

Ash didn't really like the attention. "Yeah…that's great. Can we get back on track?"

Robin throws a map of the city on the table.

Say'ri has a mini-heart attack. "This is an impressively accurate map. Who crafted it?"

Robin, with a barely concealed massive grin, gestures to Ash.

Fredrick clears his throat as Say'ri seems slightly starstruck.

_I don't know what's going on in her head. _Ash thought as Robin mades contact with the Blackbirds and put some markers on the map. _But I'm terrified._

"Ok, look over here." Robin declares, drawing everyone to the map.

"We're here." Robin taps the northern corner of the map. "Our units are currently holding the gate against the Risen…speaking of which, the second part of the Operation should be starting soon. Ash?"

"Alpha should be ready by then." Ash replies.

"Good." Robin nods. "Say'ri's rebels are up here, and the militia is over here." She then does a double take at the map. "Did the militia move?"

Nobody could tell.

"They used to be more towards the center." Robin mutters. "Did the Valmese get them to move? Damn. Chrom, we're going to get attacked soon, prepare the men."

"Right." Chrom rushes out of the command tent.

"Are we really going to be attacked?" Say'ri asks.

"Robin says so, so yes." Ash replies. "What should we worry about?"

"You just focus on the Risen operation." Robin says to him. "We'll handle any potential threats from the other side."

"Fair enough. Feel free to…" Ash snaps his fingers. "Condor to Destroyers, ready all guns for ground bombardment and standby for Robin's orders."

"Destroyers, roger." Robin hears. "We're ready for you whenever, boss."

"Ok, that's that. I'm off." Ash pats Robin's shoulder. "Stay safe out there."

"Words better used for you than by you." Robin replies with a grin. Ash just rolls his eyes and continues leaving.

Ash then poked his head back into the tent. "I almost forgot. Say'ri?"

"Yes?" She was about as confused as everyone else in the tent who wasn't Ash.

"Were you chased before you got here?"

Due to the power of context, most of the people in attendance had the wrong impression of what Ash meant.

"Uh…" Say'ri herself fell into the same trap for a few seconds, before realizing what Ash meant. "There was a large Risen General of surprising strength."

"What?" Ash looked alarmed. "Shit."

…

[1st Person Camera]

…

I know about the whole Risen tiers business. I had time to talk to Lucina and (mostly) Severa.

_Types, he means types._

I have every reason to believe that the Risen General Say'ri mentioned was a Type 3 (as in: fucking indestructible) and if it is something like that then I need to make the preparations now.

"Condor to Dendrobium." I say into the radio.

"Huh? Oh, hi boss." Nah replies. She sounds mildly sleepy.

_Naps like her mother, I bet. _"Hey, Nah; I have a reason to believe that there is a type 3 Risen within our current combat zone. Can you prepare to engage it if it shows up?"

Silence for a few seconds. "I'll be ready in a minute." Nah says with a surprising amount of determination.

"Ok, thanks. Condor out." Should I go get Nowi as well? Nah's damn good but I don't feel safe sending her by her lonesome.

…yeah, yeah I think I should.

_Do we know where Nowi is?_ _Can we find her within the next hour?_

The answer to those two questions is a resounding no. I guess we can just cross our fingers or something, Nowi tends to show up when least expected anyways. Who knows? Given that the Risen Type 3 hasn't tried to bash our skulls in yet, it might just stay home and watch Netflix.

Let's focus on murdering the Risen outside of the walls.

_We get Magna and take off into the skies._

We then do a scouting flight over the area outside of the walls. Let's see…

A vast majority of the Risen are Myrmidons, with a few Heroes mixed in. Their organization isn't too great, but the numbers present means they're…actually fairly scattered. Funny, I expected more of them.

_A small number of the Risen are attacking the gate area, but most of them are just milling around._

A few of them look up and looks at us, but otherwise they take no action…a clear difference from their aggressive behavior at the docks. Were they swarming to kill Say'ri? What makes Say'ri important? We didn't have Say'ri then, though…hrm.

_Maybe she's important to someone who has control over the Risen? I can't think of any other reason for now._

Ugh. Well, if they're not swarming then this is going to go easier. "Condor to Cavalry, do you copy?"

"Wow, it really comes through the ears." Stahl remarks. "I hear you, Ash."

What has he been doing with the earpiece until now? "How prepared is your cavalry force?"

"We're, uh, off the boats and ready to fight. I think."

Stahl goddammit I want a more accurate response

"Are you going to be ready to attack soon? I want to wrap up the Risen op before it gets dark."

"Ah…" I can hear (metaphorically) Stahl scratching his face. "Yeah. Yes. We will be." He finishes firmly.

Thank fuck for that. "Alright. Condor to all available aircraft, we're going to start the Risen cleanup operation in thirty minutes, reload and get ready for assault before then."

"Everybody?" One of the Pegasus Leads asked.

"Everybody except us." Halloween One grumbled.

"Affirmative." I say. "Sorry, Halloween, but you guys are needed by the base more."

"We know, we know. We're too important to just move anywhere." Halloween One sniffs. "It would be nice to do something other than flying in circles for a change."

"I'm the one doing the flying." Her flying partner says behind her…loudly enough that we can catch it.

"Sorry to break this up." Blackbird One interjects.

The Blackbirds are never sorry to interject…because if they don't, people die.

"What is it?" I ask her.

"There's a mob headed towards our camp."

…

[Campsite]

…

"Seriously? Shit." Robin suddenly said bolted out of the tent.

"What?" Say'ri looked around in confusion as the tent, which until now was quietly planning, suddenly erupted in motion.

"Valm has mobilized the citizenry against us." Fredrick explains for her benefit. "They are heading towards us."

"What? But the…damn, so they had a card hidden against us." Say'ri realizes.

"Most likely." Fredrick nods. "Now if you'll excuse me." He rushes out after his liege.

"We could use your help, Say'ri." Basilio notes, tossing Say'ri a new set of Killing Edges.

"And I'll be glad to give it. Lead the way." Say'ri replies after sheathing the blades quickly.

…

Robin reached the outer walls, where Chrom stood quietly observing the oncoming mass.

"Hoo…wow." Robin breathes. "That's a mob." She said of the mass of men oozing towards them.

And it was. They had pitchforks and everything.

"What could've caused this sudden change?" Chrom wonders.

"If I had to guess? Valm had agents within the mob…it's not beyond the realm of belief to think that there are highly respected men within the city that are sympathetic to Valm." Robin replies. "They probably were holding on to that respect until they needed to pacify the city again."

"So we made them come out?" Chrom smiles slightly. "Good."

"Good or not, we're going to be fighting against confused and scared peasants." Robin notes. "Might be good to find a secondary solution first."

"Shock and Awe." Ninya says. "Master maintains that the best way to discourage the peasants from their deaths is to strike with an unopposable force."

"Kill some of them to save the rest? Yikes." Robin laughs sadly. "It's probably better than fighting it out. Robin to Blackbirds."

"Yep." Blackbird One replies.

"Where are the Valm forces in that mob?" Robin asks, as the mob slows down (nobody really wants to be the first to die).

"Unknown. I don't see any dressed in Valm colors up here." Blackbird One says. "It doesn't seem like their men joined in the action."

_Alternatively, they could be in disguise. _Robin thought. "Got it, keep us informed."

"I'd rather not fight the citizenry if we can help it." Chrom notes, but drawing his silver sword all the same.

"Given the circumstances they're more likely to cause problems down the road if we let them as is." Robin sighs. "What to do, what to do…?"

"Hey, Robin." Cynthia said through the radio. "Er…wait, no, not Robin. Noire."

"Y-Yes?" Noire replies meekly.

"I'll give you a lift to the rooftops."

"Something you'd like to tell us?" Robin asks.

"Uh…yeah! Gimme a minute." Cynthia takes the time to airlift Noire onto the nearby rooftop (two, three stories high, tops) while the mob has more or less stopped outside of charging range. "So what I think is…if Valm is bringing out their hidey-people, then they would be trained."

Everybody was confused.

"She means," Severa explains after a very loud, exasperated sigh. "If Valm is playing the mob, then we'll be able to see them based on their movement, even if they're hidden in the mob…well, at least Noire will be able to."

"Watch and learn." Combat!Noire grins, staring at the mob with her bow tight.

She sees one of the men, dressed like the average peasant...with the slight glint of metal underneath his clothes. Her grin widens and she activates the two power emitters attached onto her bows.

_The ones that give her bows critical damage against Risen and orange particles._

She focuses her magical power and wreath one side of her arrow in energy, and fires her arrow somewhere to the right of her target.

The arrow flew in a diagonal arc and struck the man clean in the throat, killing him instantly. Interestingly enough, money fell out of his pockets.

"Ooh…the idiot should've stashed his take." Combat!Noire growls. "Next."

"She can change the flight of her arrows?" Say'ri voiced Robin's incredulity first. "What manner of skill is this?"

But nobody who knew was around to explain, and besides they had an operation to focus on.

In any case, Valm's grand plan was to capitalize on the reason that the battle had started in the first place: the peasantry were unhappy about high taxes and the disappearance of wealth (usually a sign of corruption) and tensions had mounted. The Rebels then showed up and fanned the flames, pushing the people past the breaking point and starting the localized civil war.

The Valmese then carefully orchestrated a gambit where they successfully killed a Rebel captain and planted a lot of gold on his body. By revealing the fact that the Rebels were loaded, they were able to swing the militia towards the neutral point (where the people hated everyone equally).

Then the Risen showed up and things went to hell, but let's not worry too much about that.

Point being, Valm is now stating that the newcomers were the cause of the Risen and the recent economic issues of the local populace (with heavy emphasis on the Risen part) and had hoped to take advantage of the panic and confusion to push enough of the mob to the Allied forces, where the resulting tension would spark a battle and damage both sides enough for Valm to regain control of the city, especially now that the Allied Forces have secured the gate against the Risen crowds.

Noire sniping one of the Valmese sleepers (a respected town elder) put the kibosh on that…though it was largely due to the elder's own cleverness. The man figured that he would need the money to grease a few palms and set some traps when necessary, and thus carried more than would usually be advised in the war zone…had he had a smaller wallet, Noire's shot would've only served to bring the hate of the public onto the Good Guys' heads instead.

But as things played out, there was money, there was confusion…

"Those Valmese bastards stole our gold!" Brady yelled at the top of his lungs, having snuck into the mob with his ability to be incredibly dangerous looking. "And they want us to die for them?!"

_Shit. _The Valmese garrison commander thought as the mob…well, devolved into a mob. Through the confusion and terror of being shot at (Robin added to this by tossing a few Elthunders over their heads) the neutral militia panicked and turned against the Valmese-friendly militia, who fought back. Some of the Valmese forces themselves panicked and attacked the Valmese-friendly militia, turning all of the militia against them.

"Wow." Robin deadpans, watching the carnage in front of her with obvious distaste. "I'm glad we're much more disciplined than that.

As they watched, their disgusted turned into actual worry.

The fighting invariably spread, and as it spread…the conflicted turned to looting and ransacking (and no small amount of torching). Not willing to engage into a confusing environment, Robin bade everyone to stay put for now, much to Chrom's disappointment.

_Different factions, some of them are better at holding granaries than others…yeah, after three days certain factions aren't getting fed anymore, and no food makes people cranky._

Robin and the archers on watch were not above sniping the occasional looter, no matter what their reason might be, though.

…

In other news, the Cavalry engagement against the Risen outside of the walls went off without a hitch. The good guys lost a few Cavaliers and Paladins, but that's the only noteworthy event in the battle.

In other other news, Nah engaged the Risen Type 3 General who was just idling underneath a market tent. According to her, she exchanged fire with it (it threw peaches at her with surprising force and she shot it with her manakete-laced beam rifle) for a few minutes before it just left.

"Good thing, too." Nah had said in her debriefing. "If we really had to fight it then the town would've been much worse for it."

Doesn't change the fact that there's a Type 3 Risen wandering around, however…

…

[1800]

…

The Valmese forces proper withdrew to their defensive lines.

The Rebel forces continued to engage the Valmese, but the sudden and utter change with the militia forces let them extend downwards to the center of the city.

The militia forces, fragmented by in-fighting, looting, and being killed by the three other factions, broke as a military power, their people scattering to whatever house they could find.

The Allied Forces reinforced their position on their side of the city and rendezvoused with the rebels, and through Say'ri the two armies were effectively one fighting force.

The Plegian forces tore the hell out of the Valmese position on the wall…and disappeared as night fell.

…

The Valmese garrison commander, realizing that being sandwiched between two unknown forces was a pretty bad place to be, decided to withdraw his forces in the middle of the night.

…

[Next day, 0900]

…

"Wow, they really left." Robin says as they pick over the remains of the Valmese camp (namely, the town barracks).

"I don't think they did it because they were afraid of us." Ash muses.

"I concur." Fredrick concurs. "Though I imagine the debacle that was yesterday was enough to make anyone flee."

Yesterday was more than just the militia self-destructing; shortly after dark some asshat decided to set fire to the town, and much of the (if we use the ocean as South) western and coastal regions of the town was set ablaze. In a stroke of luck, the later part of the night saw a fairly heavy rain, and the damage was not as catastrophic as it would've been otherwise.

"Doesn't take a genius to figure out _who_ set the fire, though." Severa scowls.

"At least they were nice enough to left the people run away." Cynthia said with forced lightness. A vast majority of the civilians who did not run away took shelter in the Valm-controlled section of the town, as it was the safest part, so when the town went up in flames, the civilians ran and dispersed throughout the town.

"Nobody burned to death, but quite a number of trampling deaths and a lot of accidents…I hesitate to call it an act of kindness." Maribelle snarls. "If I find whoever set that fire I swear to Naga…"

Ash was the only one close enough to catch what she said next.

_It was "I'll tie their testicles to their tongues."_

Ash figured it was in his best interest to keep his mouth shut.

"So what else does Valm have up their sleeve?" Robin sighs. "They can't possibly just let us have this town."

"We had heard that this town's garrison was undermanned." Say'ri says. "And that its general had gone back to Valm for some business…it was a major factor in why we decided to approach this town in the first place."

Robin pondered this information for a moment. "In other words, they have reinforcements coming along at any moment."

"Should we vacate the premises?" Ash jokes.

"Given how the rest of Valm can't possibly be any friendlier than this, we're better off staying put." Robin replies. "That being said, being bogged down in a siege battle will be disastrous to us."

The Allied forces had suffered around 50 casualties in the previous day.

"Moreover, we cannot simply leave when its people are suffering." Emmeryn adds.

_Fuck. _Ash thought. "Beg pardon, Exalt, but assuming if we get into a siege war they're the ones who're going to suffer for it."

"If we simply leave, they will suffer for having aided us." Emmeryn counters serenely.

_We never aided them. _Ash wanted to point out. _…but Valm won't know that. _He added to himself.

"We will build the local defenses for as long as we are able." Emmeryn commands. "Only then will we continue with our campaign."

Robin nods her approval. "We need this city as a supply point, too; waging a war with no logistics line is near impossible."

"I wish we were more able, your eminence." Say'ri says apologetically. "But that dog of a brother of mine has done his utmost best to undermine our efforts."

…

[1st Person camera]

…

Huh, that's new.

"Your brother is on Valm's side?" I ask her.

Say'ri is…uncomfortable, with this revelation, especially since it seems to distance the rest of us from her. "Yes, Yen'fay has pledged his allegiance to Valm. I know not of his reasons, but he is a dastard of the highest order."

So much venom.

Ok, so I know that game!Yen'fay played lapdog because he wanted to keep Say'ri safe.

Right now, Say'ri is plenty safe. We have railguns to make sure that she keeps that way. Maybe I can play this up to get Yen'fay to defect entirely? We'll need to catch him before he goes into the volcano though.

_How loyal are his troops to him?_

Um…if Walhart is as competent as I think he is, his troops should be as loyal as Yen'fay. That is, they're only loyal to Yen'fay if Yen'fay is loyal to Walhart.

That being said, a lot of factors are different now.

_"I hope you do not think too differently of us." Say'ri says to Robin._

_"Differing ideologies happen all the time. Don't worry about it." Robin reassures her._

…

In any case, we spend the rest of the morning checking the walls and securing the city.

After lunch though? As expected, the archers on the walls raised an alarm, and we rushed up to see a lot of flags arrayed outside of the walls.

"Wow. Guess we lucked out." Lissa grumbles. "More work for me."

That…that's a big army. "Condor to Blackbird, do you have a visual on the new Valmese army?" I say into the radio.

"Blackbird Two, I see them. I'm estimating at least ten thousand."

Functionally meaningless estimate is meaningless.

That being said, it's definitely a bigger force than the garrison force earlier. "Troop composition?" I ask her.

"Um…" Blackbird Two (probably) takes some pictures. "Seems to be mostly light troops…might be why they moved so quickly."

"Sounds like they were expecting to get supplied here." Robin notes. "Their general must've had good confidence in his commander."

_We still don't have separate radio frequencies._

"Didn't work out too well for him, it seems." I reply…still, it's a massive disadvantage for us. Looks like we're in for a siege.

.

.

.

Ahahahah yeah right.

"Robin, I have a plan." I say to her.

She grins back. "What a coincidence, so do I."

…

[Valm Camp]

…

General Farber (the boss of the stage) was none too happy at having his city usurped when he was away. But he was a man who knew of his priorities, and settled on placing the offending garrison commander in the front lines instead of killing him for desertion immediately.

He rubbed his temples. Originally, the plan was to bring these somewhat underequipped troops into the city so they could be properly armored. Obviously that wasn't a possibility now, and according to the scouts the walls were well defended, so even though he had an overwhelming advantage in manpower it would be costly to take it back with an assault.

_And the nail in the proverbial coffin is the dolt again. _He grumbled in his head. _By setting a fire to cover the escape of his few hundred men, he's managed to set the entirety of the city against us!_

Farber consoled himself on the knowledge that, at the very least, the escapees brought some of the equipment from the barracks that they could make use of.

Shaking off his doubts, he turned his mind towards devising some form of strategy to take the town. Despite the winter being mild, it was still winter, and the weather could change at any time. Moreover, they didn't bring the foodstuffs required for a prolonged siege, and the town had naval access.

Thus, attack fast, attack hard…if they had ladders, which they didn't…

…

[1st Person Camera]

…

"Condor to Robin: check in."

"Robin here, 1st Cavalry unit: I don't think they noticed our exit, but we're still moving to position."

I gave Robin a few of the Screen Cover spells. With Robin's magical power she can create a screen a mile long, so she can maneuver around large armies so long as she keeps quiet.

"Condor to Fredrick: check in."

"My Great Knights and I are ready for your command." Fredrick replies confidently. "Take care that you utilize us effectively, _Commander._"

Fredrick is our mainline puncher (along with Stahl), and Robin deferred command to us for this operation.

"I copy…Condor to Phoenix?"

"All aircrafters ready." Rafale One replies. I've slipped up so many times calling my girls aircraft (and they never knew what it meant) that they've adopted the word as…well, a person who's trade is to kick ass in the sky. I think it's accurate. "We're ready to strike on your orders."

Good… "Condor to Enterprise, Destroyers."

"Data from the Blackbirds are good, all guns are loaded." Ninya reported. "We're ready to strike at any time, master."

Wonderful… "Alright. Halloween Squadron, you are cleared for hard strike."

"Halloween One, roger…taking aim." _The girl narrowed one eye and aimed her gun at the largest enemy tent she could find._

…

[Valm Camp]

…

General Farber happened to look up, and saw two (or was it four?) Pegasus Knights flying high over their heads.

He stared at them in minor confusion for a few seconds, before remembering the information that the guard commander brought him…namely, the Pegasus Knights, _somehow_, was the life blood of the enemy army.

"Alert the Snipers, bring down those flyers." Farber commanded to one of his sub-captains, inwardly cursing the recent lack of air power.

The movement at his camp was all Halloween One needed.

Farber's guards looked around in shock as the tent of their general exploded. They were under attack.

…

"Clean hit! Clean hit!" Halloween One reported into her radio.

"All Phoenix Squadron members, commence bombing run. Go, go, go!" I order.

…[3rd Person]…

The Valmese forces, confused and surprised by the sudden explosion of their general's tent (and his probable demise) then had their attention stolen by the flight of Pegasi in the sky.

"Why are their wings red?" One of the peasant soldiers wondered as Valmese Wyvern riders climbed up to meet the newcomers.

In response, the Allied Force Wyvern Knights flying up high split into numerous pairs and zoomed down to meet the Valmese Wyverns in combat. Due to the fact that two is oftentimes greater than one, except in some fringe cases, the Valmese air units were systematically taken down without much hassle.

The Valmese soldiers then noticed a strange occurrence at the edge of their camp. People were dying to something as if being washed by a wave of death…or being exploded by it. The metaphors get a bit mixed up when one is watching the person in front of them suddenly sustain a cut…or simply lose a limb.

"First rounds are away." Rafale One states, having dropped all of their Shrapnel bombs. "Doing second pass with incendiaries."

"Condor, roger." Ash replies. "Blackbirds, give word to Destroyer: commence fire, commence fire. Robin, where are you?"

"Still moving into position." Robin replies, riding at half gallop. "The map is big, cut me a little slack."

…

The Valmese troops, first surprised by their general suddenly dying, then surprised by their soldiers dying en-masse, are now terrified by the earth around them exploding with massive plumes into the sky.

And, of course, the carpet of fire falling onto the Earth.

_Bonus points: The bombs use animal fat and other oils, and the ground is wet due to last night's rain._

Since the only things burnable in the winter landscape around the Valmese camp were tents and carts, those things went up in flames surprisingly fast, dotting the landscape with small fires and plumes of smoke.

Between the burning, the smoke, the explosions, the fires…the Valmese regulars were having the polar opposite of a good day right now.

"Dear Naga, this is war as done from the Outrealms?" Fredrick breathes, watching the carnage while waiting at the head of his detachment. "Are we charging into that, Ash?"

"Not yet: too risky." Ash replies, circling over the bombardment zone. "And if I had better tools I could do better. There's a lot of effective weaponry from where I come from."

"I can't imagine how bad wars are in your homeland." Stahl deadpans.

"It can get real bad sometimes." Ash replies a little sadly. "It got real bad a few times. History's history though. Robin, are you in position?"

"Yeah." Robin replies. "Though our mounts are a different story."

_Fair's fair. _Ash thought. _Never expected them to do the brunt of the charging. _"Alright, rest as you are able. We'll have you guys hop in pretty soon."

…

"Pretty soon" was a matter of minutes, though as far as the Valmese soldiers were concerned, the reprieve from the sky being on fire couldn't have come long enough.

By now, most if not all of the soldiers have understood that they were under attack from the sky, and scanned the skies fearfully, desperately, in case another attack came…and the attacks were still coming, in the form of explosions tearing into the earth.

Once the explosions ceased, the soldiers, now scattered, burned, terrified, confused, panicked, and leaderless, realized that the rumbling around them was not, in fact, from the mysterious firepower tearing into the ground, but from the hooves of enemy cavalry charging at them from the front.

And the back.

One guy was smart enough to turn around and realize that they were being flanked on two sides.

Robin, having the cavalry that was comparatively more worn out having to maneuver into position, opted for a slower charge, making up for the lack of impact with tossing Thorons all over the place.

Credit where it's due: the disconcerted Valmese infantry—especially the elites—reformed into combat lines surprisingly quickly while retrieving whatever lances they could find to form a shield wall against the oncoming cavalry.

_Bah, our position is subpar. _Fredrick scowls. _Plus, they've already reinforced…as expected of the Valmese regulars._

"Fredrick, be advised, do not break off your charge." He heard Ash over the radio. "We'll soften that wall for you."

Fredrick was about to ask how, before a series of explosions tore into the Valmese soldiers…not killing them outright (the ammo used was too fragile) but hitting them with enough force to turn the shield wall into a mess.

A mess that Fredrick and his Great Knights slammed into with devastating effect.

…

Within the timespan of five minutes, the Valmese army routed, with its elements scattering everywhere.

"Phoenix Squadron, commence mop up operation." Ash orders as he flies low with his rifle. "Prioritize the enemy officers that are fast runners."

"That seems a bit vindictive." Robin laughs. "Any particular reason?"

"The countries will need good generals after we're done with Valm." Ash answers. "Might as well weed out the cowards now."

…

[1st Person Camera, Next day]

…

So…we did the post-battle tally. We lost around 20 cavalry, mostly Cavaliers.

The Valmese army was roughly six thousand men and we killed around two thousand in the actual fighting…most of them due to the bombardment, as expected.

We killed about fifty, sixty officers, most of them low-ranking. We killed the ones that abandoned their men, mostly.

_Wouldn't it have been better to let them go?_

Letting Valm have shitty officers would be good in the short term, but our ultimate enemy is Grima. If I want Valm to join in on the dragon killing then the last thing I need is an allied army led by idiots.

Anyways, overall? Great success. We mauled the hell out of Valm and as far as Say'ri (and by extension, the city) is concerned the Allied Force are "Fucking Awesome" in size 72 font bold face with sparkles around the borders and airhorns blaring. We now effectively have her total support (and in return she has total support of some rebellion factions closest to her).

On the other hand…

We, the Phoenix Company, caught a lot of attention, and I'm primarily worried about the people who are powerful and envious. Any strategist worth their salt has realized how much sway our equipment has on the battlefield.

The fact that we're balls to the walls strong has also made us implicit enemies of some other rebel groups. Probably. I don't actually have evidence, but I feel like it's what would reasonably happen if somebody came from overseas with superior equipment under the idea of freedom.

_Not a jab at the 2015 world political climate._

Either way, the local, anti-Valm populace are overjoyed, the rebels have taken over…_kind of_…and we ensured that anyone who was pro-Valm was allowed to…well, not really leave, since its winter, but stay and be unharmed.

_Active mind failed to mention: The town is under our (as in, Ash's) ownership. Of the big names that are participating in this campaign, Emmeryn and Basilio were the other two who would reasonably take and hold cities with no serious backlash within the army itself._

Emmeryn didn't hold the town because she's Emmeryn, and isn't looking to annex territory. Basilio had roughly the same reasons…as he says: "Ferox's large enough; I don't feel like having to swim to see another part of our land."

Say'ri and the rebellion are in control but don't _technically _have the town, as it would cause similar tensions to Valm holding the town. So she says, but eh.

Anyways, so that just leaves me…well, more precisely, the townspeople kind of elected me to be the mayor as the last guy was pro-Valm and died during the rioting and looting, and we have the (somewhat inflated) reputation of being a man of the people.

I'm rather uncomfortable with this. Not because I don't want the town (I do, as it gives me a foothold on Valm proper) but because it's extra baggage right now. Five years from now I'll absolutely take the town, though.

_Our Ten Year Plan: Kill Evil Death Dragon, Find Nino's Home and bring her home, Make Shitton of Money through Monopolizing International Trade, Maybe Collaborate With Anna to Make Shitton of Money through Monopolizing Interdimensional Trade, Conquer World(?). Conquer All Worlds(?)._

Hmm…

We didn't get as many issues with using the equipment this time. Fredrick voiced a few complaints, but he was ultimately appreciative of the fact that we won with minimal losses. The general consensus seems to be that as long as I keep a tight lid on the weapons and use it only for military exertions the repercussions of utilizing our equipment will be fairly subdued.

There is obviously going to be backlash if we get into lopsided battles (and, of course, if the Destroyers end up mowing people down with its anti-aircraft guns) but as long as we relegate ourselves to supporting roles they should become more used to the idea over time…assuming, of course, that none of our shit gets stolen.

_Good thing our gear is designed to self-destruct on examination._

The guns are built so that if they are not disassembled in the correct way the inside of the gun will ignite the spell papers and turn the gun into a metal tube. As far as I know, apart from myself, Nino and Ninya are the only ones who know how the disassembly works.

_The Future children's equipment does not have this feature._

…

So what do we do now?

Well, first off, it's winter. Campaigning is hard in winter even if the weather is fair.

Emmeryn wants the allied forces to stay and help rebuild the town. Robin agrees, and the vast majority of forces are staying to ensure that the town gets built and refortified as our supply point into Valm. Given the difference in military power between us and Valm, the supply point probably won't last too long once Valm decides to move, so either Walhart will need to be taken down before then, or Valm as a nation will need to be utterly shattered by the rebels before they can bring down the hammer.

Say'ri wants to get a symbol of rebellion, and names get tossed around for a little bit (including ours) before deciding on Tiki, the Speaker of Naga. Say'ri's preparing for a trip to the Mila Tree…apparently Valm does not have a garrison around it this time (its neutral ground even for them).

_It's got its minuses. On one hand we don't have to fight chapter 16, on the other hand Valm has another army free to move as it chooses._

The Phoenix Company, per my orders, will run scouting and ground strike missions on villages surrounding our new town. We're not going to do serious damage to any stationed armies or garrisons but if we can lop an incendiary into a barracks or something then it will be a job well done. Given by what I've seen, the Valmese air force is in shambles, so we should be able to deal significant damage through just hit and run tactics. Hopefully enough to get their soldiers to start breaking and running every time they see our Pegasi and the glowing wings.

…

But, at the end of the day, we're not going to make any real headway until Tiki joins our group, so we'll be flying out with her when that day comes.

.

.

.

{ === + === }

Author Notes:

Fallout Binge finished. Waiting for patches and mods now.


	31. Valm Campaign - To Mila Tree

{ === + === }

So, uh…

You know how I was like "Oh the winter has been mild so far"?

Well winter decided that it was being too nice.

_For the past five days out of the week, the sky opened up and dumped crushingly heavy snow on us._

Uh…let's organize this a bit.

So!

Let's call Day Zero the day after we offed the Valmese would-have-been sieging army.

_The end of the previous chapter._

We spent Day One doing recon over the area around the town that can be reasonably covered within roughly two hours of flight (so a full trip takes four hours). We skirmished with a few Valmese air elements and dropped some bombs on some military camps, but nothing overly major.

We spent Day Two touring the towns we found on Day One and systematically obliterating every Valmese garrison and camp we saw. I think this was the day we gave every Pegasus Knight a Thor anti-ground cannon and incendiary ammunition (brittle nails dipped in oil and set on fire during launch).

_Highlight of the day: We found a camp of roughly 1000 Valmese troops erected literally in the middle of an open field. We then turned the camp into a smoking hole in the ground._

Proverbially speaking; we didn't have the firepower to actually turn it into a hole…it's more like a smoking mild depression, which sounds awfully like a psychological condition.

Anyways.

We spent Days Three to Seven being snowed in.

Like, "the Enterprise almost capsized due to the snow on its deck" snowed in.

The snow also gave Robin second thoughts about how to proceed with the campaign, or, as she put it, "I don't feel like starving to death in Valm just because we were rash."

Strictly speaking the Pheonix Company (and I think the Shepherds as well) can supply and fight even with a thin supply line.

_What about with no supply line?_

Our airgirls won't be able to conduct bombing missions due to a lack of bombs, and most of our guns won't work with irregular ammo, but at the very least they'll be able to use their Thors…though it won't be nearly as effective.

Assuming, of course, that nothing breaks down…which is a stupid assumption to make.

Anyways…

We spent the days prepping, as there was nothing to do. Prepping, and busting out the anti-snow gear.

_Read: exceptionally heavy and fluffy coats._

Nowi commandeered like two of them and now she resembles a ball with a Nowi inside of it.

She's also commandeered an abandoned and broken table and has gone sledding due to the sheer amount of snow being piled at our walls.

_We're watching her take the table down the slope right now._

She…goes about halfway down and then the table gets caught on something. Nowi, not having installed anything resembling grips on the sledtable (tablesled?), is immediately catapulted off of said table and is now rolling down the hill.

_Laughing like a maniac all the while._

Eventually she comes to a stop a very, very long distance away. Judging by the fact that she's not getting up, she's probably wearing too many layers to actually get up.

"Oh, mother…" Nah sighs deeply into her gloves.

_She's watching the scene along with us, as we're sitting on the walls with nothing to do._

"Why can't she act more mature?" Nah asks of her gloves.

_Nah's wearing our specially made winter clothing, complete with multiple magical nodes inside of it with spell paper to provide heat._

She's also wearing a thicker cloak…her coloring makes her look like she's wearing a Santa outfit.

_We made that realization three days ago and gave her a red hat with a small fluffy ball on top. She accepted with utter confusion._

"She's plenty mature." I reassure Nah as we watch Cynthia fish Nowi out of the snow with the SAR gear. "Whenever she feels like it."

Nah is disbelieving as we watch Cynthia drag Nowi back home…with the rope, so it looks like Cynthia's dragging a big ball through the sky.

Wups.

_Nowi hit a tree and is broken free of the rope._

Cynthia EVENTUALLY delivers her safely back, and she waddles up here to the wall with us.

Sheesh. "You're wearing way too many layers."

"But it's coooold!" Nowi whines.

For the record, the winter here is probably warmer than the one we experienced in Ylisse or the Coast. If only by a little.

"It's not that cold, Nowi. Cynthia!"

Cynthia lands and salutes. "At the ready!"

"Juice Nowi and turn her into something less round, please."

Nowi looks alarmed as Cynthia ropes her again and drags the little Manakete off.

_We ignore her wails of "Nowi's not a fruit!"_ _and watch the duo go back to the Enterprise._

"Sometimes I wonder if her immaturity is because of her surroundings." Nah sighs, with a less-than-subtle accusing glance at me.

"Eh…" I…I can't really argue that. "Yeah, that's pretty much it."

Nah huffs. "Boss, you really should set a better example for her."

I grin. "I can do a lot of things, setting a good example isn't one of them."

"How responsible." She says with utter dejection.

I think I'm breaking whatever mental image she had of us…whatever mental image she had left of us.

…Anyways, all we're doing is waiting for the snow to end.

_A bit of an understatement. We're still assisting in the reconstruction effort which is GREATLY hampered by the snow and the lack of lumber._

A bit of an unfortunate situation: there's a forest nearby that can be harvested from but the snow makes transportation impossible.

We've also sent the Inazuma and Ikatsuchi home (along with some of the transport fleet) for supply. Given that its winter time and we're in pseudo medieval times, food's a pretty big concern all around at this time of the year.

Except for us Phoenix, as we also need replacement parts to service our equipment along with the usual provisions. While our rifle equipment is fairly durable (a byproduct of keeping the engineering simple) they do need more care than a stock sword or lance to keep working.

…

…

In any case, it snowed for a grand total of two weeks.

Between the biting cold, razor-like winds, ice, snow, and the general sense of morale that kind of weather tend to cause, both the Allied Forces and the Valmese forces stayed holed up for the entire duration of those two weeks.

At least I think the Valmese forces holed up like we did. I can't imagine them campaigning while Winter tried his damned best to kill literally all of us.

And as quickly as the snowstorm came, it left.

The weather is sunny, the sky is clear, it's cold as balls (which is more in line of what winter weather should be).

Ocean effect snow is a thing, right?

…

_In any case, after the snow subsided, we're out here aboard the Enterprise doing an once-over of its equipment, namely the catapults, to ensure that everything is in working order._

The snow ended yesterday, everyone's super bundled out here.

_The Shepherds are helping the city clean up the snow while returning to their reconstruction effort._

I can't imagine that going too well with literally all the snow of Canada between the forest and the city.

_Disclaimer: we've never been to Canada._

I talked with Robin and Say'ri earlier at breakfast. The Rebel Princess is in the mood to visit the Mila Tree tomorrow.

Reason: we're at war and time's a wastin' (though not necessarily expressed in that format).

Strictly speaking I agree, but I do feel like moving too quickly through enemy controlled territory without proper scouting and preparation would be a little too dangerous.

_"Have no fear, Sir Ash." Say'ri had reassured us. "The Mila Tree is a sacred site of all who worship Naga, and Valm is by far the most ardent of the believers. They would not desecrate their beliefs by shedding blood at the most holiest of sites."_

Which is a very roundabout way of saying "We're going to fight at the Mila Tree, so bring some big guns."

Am I getting too paranoid? I feel like I'm getting too paranoid.

…

Speaking of being paranoid.

_One of the guards just escorted two small girls wearing some very pretty white cloaks aboard the ship. The trio is headed in our direction._

Those girls seem too young to be service members for our ships. They're like...we're not really tall to begin with, and those girls reach our waist at best.

"What's all this then?" I ask.

_With the barest hint of a bad Cockney accent._

…It says a lot about the random crap I do when the guard doesn't even care. "Sir, I found these two girls snooping about the docks.

The snow caused our lookouts to slack some. Not surprised.

_The two girls look terrified._

Let's see…both have light chestnut brown hair, one has short, bobbed hair and the other has long hair that she keeps in check via small ponytail. Both of them look like they could seriously use a brush.

_We've already clued in to who they represent, and there's a desperate fight for us to keep the god of all creepy smiles from showing up on our face._

"I'm fairly certain children pose no security risk, but good work." I say to the guard. "You may return to your duties; stay warm out there."

"Sir." He salutes, turns, and leaves.

"Now then." I address the girls.

_They very visibly jump._

I'm going to refer to them as the Raiden girls from now on.

Raiden Senior (the bob hair) looks at me worriedly. "Are…are we in trouble?"

Yes. "Depends on how honest you are; what are the two of you doing around my fleet? I've never seen anyone as young as you aboard my ships." I ask, while looking as serious and as friendly as possible.

_We're screwing up on one front._

Raiden Junior (ponytail) looks like she's on the verge of tears. "We're sorry!" She blurts out.

On one hand, super adorable and makes me want to hug her.

On the other, proof of guilty conscience? I go for my knife with an exaggerated florish.

"We're not baddies!" Raiden Senior yells desperately while flailing her arms around. "We're good girls! Honest! Super honest!"

_I would like to point out that we just threatened two twelve year olds with murder._

"Well, then what are you good girls doing on my ship?" I ask again.

"We…uh…" Raiden Senior seems to be doing some mental math.

…Seriously? I just threatened to shank them and she's still mulling it over?

Hmm…"You." I specifically target Raiden Junior (she goes 'eep!' at us addressing her). "Why are you on my ship?"

"I…I…"

_We made her cry._

She mumbles something about wanting to be with her friends.

"Hey!" Raiden Senior hisses at her sister.

Raiden Junior mumbles something else, I can't really make it out. I imagine it's an explanation of some kind.

Again, little girls versus proper maintenance of morale and discipline among the ranks. "This is Condor broadcasting a message to all ships." I declare to my radio.

_The two girls freeze in shock and terror._

"I have two children currently under my detainment wearing white cloaks. If anyone has someone who knows anything about the two of them, please send that personnel to the Enterprise officer lounge immediately."

I go off radio. "Alright, follow me."

_We go to the lounge with the two terrified girls while the rest of the sailors look on in puzzlement._

"Valm spies?" One of the sailors asks.

"No clue. Don't think so though." I respond.

_We bring the two girls into the lounge and they sit in stunned silence for a few minutes._

I wonder if their world is collapsing around them?

After a few minutes of waiting, a girl with (long and somewhat ruffled) white hair and a nice looking hat shows up at the officer lounge doorway.

Along with Robin and Ninya…along with the Captain of the Hibiki.

"It sounded interesting." Robin answers when I look at her with surprise and confusion.

_We're not surprised at Ninya showing up. She's in charge of administration and this event sounds a lot like a case of oversight._

"Don't you have some more official duties to attend to?" I ask Robin as she wheels Girl Number Three to a soft seat and sits her down.

_We will refer to her as Verniy from now on. This is probably the most on-the-nose nickname we're using._

"I'm a fighter, not a builder." Robin grins. "Leave the fieldwork to the professionals, I say."

Riiight. "Anyways, I assume you have a proper explanation for me?" My question is directed at the Hibiki's captain.

He salutes. "Yes sir, that girl is the daughter of one of my lieutenants. A Mage corps leader, to be precise."

The girl nods politely.

"Do you have a rollcall you can refer to?" Robin asks us (but mostly Ninya).

"Don't bother." I sigh. "I can guess what's going on." I point to Verniy. "You were brought on board the ship despite not having qualified and you" I point to the captain. "Let her."

"That's correct, sir." The captain nods.

"And the two of you" The Raiden sisters jump as I address them again. "Snuck aboard our ships to be with your friend."

"How admirable…if a little stupid." Ninya comments cooly.

"Why did you allow this?" I ask the Hibiki's Captain…perhaps a little more demanding than I intended.

He takes a deep breath. "Sir, it's because—" He stops as he hears what sounds like a cat yowling outside the room.

There's no cat on the ship.

_Cat yowl followed by a sharp cry of pain._

Followed by a girl with purple-black hair diving into the room…who herself is followed by two guards. Judging by the stance of one of the guards she had targeted his balls in order to make her escape.

Enjoyably funny, but a little worrisome about the status of our defenses.

_Do you really want to tell your guards to shoot children on sight?_

"Wait! Wait wait wait!" Purple hair yells as she stands up while beating the dust out of her white cloak.

We patiently wait for her until it seems like she doesn't actually have a follow up statement.

_We also gesture to the guards to stand down._

"Are you a friend of theirs?" I ask her.

"I am their leader!" She puffs her chest out proudly.

Huh. "So you're responsible for everything that's happened so far?"

_She deflates. _"Er…not…exactly."

"Continue." I gesture to the Hibiki's captain.

…

[Press A to skip exposition]

…

Whoooo…boy. What a mess.

Let's see.

First off, all four of them are students from _the_ magical academy in Mustafa's town. It's a small place with only a handful of students, but the doors are only open to the elite.

_Read: People with the money to pay for tuition._

Purple Hair belongs to a family of lesser nobles and had originally intended to become a Pegasus Knight. Sometime last year, however, her parents were killed during a Risen attack, leaving the little girl in charge of her family and title.

Given that she's like 12, maybe 13, the prospects of her keeping said title intact was next to nil…but I need to talk about the other girls first.

The Raiden Sisters belong to a family of Plegian Bigshots, and used to live in the Plegian Capital of I Don't Know What It's Called. Their family also had a bit of a Montague-Capulet style feud with an equally large family within the city.

Due to the Plegian War (and subsequent civil war) her family lost favor in the city, as Gangrel was no longer king. The City itself fell under the control of a Plegian General who was a family friend of their rivals, setting them up for a very bloody midnight strike. The Raiden's family was attacked and the estate burned to the ground.

Long story short, the Raiden Sisters, through a combination of great fortune and loyal retainers, made it to the Plegian-Feroxi border (which, as they were 12 and 11 at the time, was one hell of a feat) and found a small town. There they worked as militia mages for a while until the town got into a fight with the Risen.

The militia did reasonably ok protecting the town, and the skirmish caught the attention of some members of the Phoenix Flight who were doing practice patrols at the time. The Squadrons interfered, ran some Close Air Support, and helped save the village.

_We vaguely recall seeing one of these battles in our reports, but seeing as it was effectively a random skirmish battle we never paid it too much heed._

Anyways, the performance of those squad members caught the girls' attention, and after saving money from their job they made the trip to Mustafa's town, as it was closer to their town than my city was.

There, they met Purple, who by now was the sole owner of her title (and was in danger of losing it through Fucking Politics™) and the three became fast friends.

Some time later they met Verniy (approximately nine months ago). They learned about how my city was building four ships in the Mustafa Town Docks and were looking for talented mages to help serve aboard the ship as personnel from her.

Purple thus made the decision to get her two new friends into the local magic academy (hence the heavy-looking white cloaks; it was their winter uniform) to train and learn and become the "Bestest Mages Ever!"

One problem.

I had set an age requirement for service members. They had to be at least sixteen years old.

None of the four girls were sixteen.

_"I'm definitely mature enough." Purple grumbled, swinging her legs because they didn't reach the ground from her seat._

Thus, Verniy (at the behest of Purple) asked her father for a position aboard the ship. Her father, being capable of logical reasoning and processing a sound mind, initially refused.

Once he learned of our battle against the million man Risen army and had enough information to corroborate the fact that, yes, it was actually true, he changed his mind. Verniy was allowed to accompany him aboard the ship.

He then presented his argument to the Hibiki's captain, and the argument was pretty much "It was safer on the boat than off it."

Given that he knew about the fact that the Hibiki was being built for the sake of FIGHTING A WAR that was one hell of a statement to make. The Hibiki Captain pretty much then decided to give the girl an ad-hoc skills test. Verniy passed, and she was introduced aboard the ship as a support mage for the guns, and then the fact that she was polite, well-spoken, mature, and incredibly adorable catapulted her to the dubious position of ship mascot.

On the other hand, if Verniy was ever in danger I'm pretty sure the entire ship would ride to her rescue, so in a sense the ship was the safest place for her to be.

I wonder if this is why Mustafa opted to stay behind this time? His town sounds like it attracts all the bad elements mine had the fortune to avoid.

_I'm sure we have a lot of factional infighting going on behind the scenes too. Ignorance is bliss until the smart people have the upper hand._

Hmm…I guess I should send some personnel home to help manage the city at some point.

Anyways.

Verniy made it in, the other three girls didn't, so Purple made the decision to smuggle herself aboard the Hibiki and be with her friend (going, I assume, under the belief that it was easier to beg for forgiveness than to ask for permission). She screwed up and smuggled herself aboard the Akatsuki instead.

_She never paid a lot of attention to reading and writing, apparently._

Raiden Senior had proverbial balls, though, and just waltzed aboard the Ikatsuchi like she belonged there. In an act of incredible, heinous oversight, the crew just let her be on board.

_She was, however, a reasonably powerful mage and made herself useful the best she could, and given that we're always a tad short-handed, she got to stay._

Raiden Junior, on the other hand…she, being the shy one, utterly panicked and lost her shit. She went straight to Mustafa, told him everything (jury's out on if he was listening or not) and he gave her special permission to sail along with the Inazuma to reunite with her friends. When she's not terrified though she's impressively perceptive, and that's always a good thing.

…

So after listening to all of that, here we are, rubbing our temples, going "fuck me, why" under our breath.

"Ash, you wouldn't send these hardworking, ambitious young girls home for nothing, will you?" Robin asks…in the most wheedling way possible.

"Oh believe me, I'm very tempted." I sigh. "By no rights are any of them supposed to be here."

"Even her?" Robin pinches Verniy's cheeks softly. "She qualifies."

I sigh harder. "Ok, the problem is not if they have the talent to be here; the age restriction is in place so we do not get slammed by the accusation of using child soldiers. Plus, it's just outright dangerous, even aboard our warships."

"It's more dangerous for us to be at home." Purple points out. "Especially as I do not have one anymore."

_The plot against her title did not succeed (Mustafa caught it) but the plot against her mansion did. It would've done more had she not sold the thing beforehand._

That's honestly not my problem.

"Ash, don't kick these girls out just because they broke your rules." Robin says softly, but firmly. "They're so cute, after all."

_"Yep!" Raiden Senior agrees._

Ugh. The problem is this: by default, my authority is strongest in the Phoenix Company…to nobody's surprise. I have some level of control over the Shepherds by virtue of being friends and allies with the Ylissean Royal House, and some level of control over the Ylissean/Feroxi army for the same reasons.

I have the weakest control over the rebel forces for those exact same reasons. Now, the way I see it, as the war goes on the rebels will start to make up a greater and greater section of our forces. If our conversation with Ignatius was any indication, the factional infighting among the Rebel forces will be as bad as it is among the Valm-allied forces. If that's the case, then any reputation I burn for being soft on discipline will then negatively affect our (Phoenix's) unit cohesion with the rest of the army. The Phoenix will understand that I made a gut-feeling call and trust my instincts. The same cannot be said of the rebels.

_That being said, if we kick these very obviously hard working young girls off of our ships, it will drastically affect the morale within our own group. Being either hard or soft here has consequences._

Utlimately, Purple is the ringleader.

_She knows it too._

"Um…" Purple gets our attention. She takes a deep calming breath. "I'm willing to bear any kind of punishment, if you'll take the other three as pers-personnel for the ships."

_She stuttered! She Stuttered! She tried to use a hard word and stuttered! Squeeee~_

"That's not an option." I shake my head. "Robin, if you suddenly found four girls within the Shepherd's roster, what would you do?"

_Purple sits down in dejection as Robin ponders our question._

"I would carefully assess their strengths and weaknesses before making a decision." Robin finally says.

"Damn straight." I get up.

_Raiden Junior shivers._

"You." I gesture to a guard, who stands to attention. "Get me Nino." He salutes and leaves.

"So that means…?" Raiden Senior beams at us.

"That means it's going to be hell for the lot of you." I tap her head gently. "I'm making a special exception for the four of you to stay on as mages."

_They celebrate. Raiden Junior however is still terrified._

"Wh-what do you mean by hell?" She asks us timidly. I just want to hold her and reassure her that everything is going to be just fine.

But no.

_In short order Nino shows up. She's a little annoyed we pulled her out of whatever it is she was doing._

Welp. "Nino, put these four girls through the Stars program."

She glances at said girls. "They're kids."

"Yep."

"Wait, what's the Stars program?" Robin asks me.

"I got the idea from Fredrick." I admit.

"You _monster_!" Robin growls.

"Wait." Raiden Senior is now worried, looking quickly between me, Robin, and Nino. "What's going on?"

"The Stars program is how we make field combat mages…of Nino's caliber." I say. Nino takes a polite bow. "At this point she's effectively the strongest mage in the Phoenix Company…with the exception of Morgan, but he's an edge case regardless."

"So…" Purple glances at me with worry.

"So, I expect the four of you to pass the program." I stare into her eyes. "I can only make an exception for exceptional people. Do you understand?"

"Um…" She frowns.

_D'aww._

"So we can only stay if we prove to be better than everyone else?" Verniy figures it out first.

I nod. "You got it. If you want me to believe that I don't have to divert resources to babysit the four of you, then you'll have to prove it to everybody else."

"We'll do it!" Raiden Senior declares triumphantly, pulling her sister up with her. "We'll be the best mages you've ever seen!"

"How much of Fredrick's teachings did you use, Ash?" Robin asks warily.

"Eh…some." I grin.

"Dear Naga, protect these innocent young souls from the Demons unleashed by Fredrick." Robin prays softly. "Also give me a ladle to bash Ash's head in for subjecting these children to the Fredrick Fitness Hour."

"It's a watered down version." I point out. "Though it lasts longer."

Robin glares at us. "Make it two ladles."

…

…

[Next Day, Dawn]

…

…

We prepare to leave with Say'ri.

"Just the two of you?" Chrom had asked last night.

I nod. "I would personally love to fly with a wingman, but…"

Say'ri takes over. "It would not do for Valm to seize upon our incursion and spin it into an advantageous position for themselves."

Chrom mulled it over, and then went "Alright, then I will go with you."

Cue Fredrick losing his shit™.

"I will go, and we will call it a meeting with the Speaker." Chrom smile slightly. "It's much easier to name it a mission of diplomacy if one of the top leaders go, don't you think?"

We couldn't really argue with that (unless we wanted to replace him with Emmeryn and that's an even worse idea) so we opted to let Chrom come along with Cherche.

_Why Cherche? And why are we so worried about how it looks politically?_

We're worried about the politics because we need to establish ourselves as the unequivocal Good Guys of this fight. It doesn't really affect the Valmese Campaign itself, but ensuring that we get on good terms with the various factions within Valm will make our future Campaign against Grima easier.

And as for Cherche…

NPC Kyle (her lieutenant) has a good grasp on command already, so Cherche is free, plus she's the only one with the control to use her cruise engines with the same level of power output and duration like we can.

Sumia in particular wasn't too happy about that, and Cordelia was utterly livid, but they would just burn out if they tried to keep up with the inherently faster Wyverns, so…meh.

"A normal Wyvern Rider should be able to reach the Mila Tree from here by sundown." Say'ri informs us as we get ready to launch from the Enterprise. She was a bit surprised by the catapult but figured we knew what we were doing.

We got some new stuff from home, so what better time than to test them than right now?

_The resupply we got from home brought in some interesting advancements._

First we have the streamlined turbines that replace the turbines we're currently using, which improve the Cruise engine top speed by a little bit.

Second we have prototype parachutes.

_It took us TWO YEARS and help from a sub-developer to address the idea of "what happens if our girls bail out over dry land?"_

I don't remember his name, but the guy went on his own and developed these prototype attachments to our armor. Unfortunately they don't actually _work_, as the material he used to brace the attachments to the armor wasn't strong enough and when the parachutes activate during trials in the sky the attachments just rip off and fly away on their own.

_Plus there's the issue of a gently falling object being an easy target for enemy archers, but hopefully we won't have to worry about that._

He has the go-ahead to refine the design along with the armorer Smiths, so maybe we'll get parachutes built in to the new armors we're working on.

Spoilers: the new armor is really damn good. I don't know if we'll get to use them for Valm though.

Uh…I lost track. What were we doing?

_Catting from the Enterprise._

Right.

…

Let's make sure Say'ri's properly braced in front of us.

_She is, though she's uncomfortable with us fiddling with the straps on her body._

Tough. "Condor to Enterprise, we're ready to deploy."

"Enterprise, copy." Ninya replies. "Safe travels, master."

_The catapults me and Cherche are using angle about ten degrees into the air._

"That looks like so much fun." Nowi sighs.

She (and Nah) wanted to go too. Nowi just wanted to play, but Nah was worried about the vanishing Type 3 Risen she was tasked to fight.

We told them to stay at base because the base just needs them more. We're going to the Mila Tree. Worst case scenario we'll have Tiki on our side.

_I can hear the rails humming._

Spool up the engines…

_A crewman separates us, then Cherche, from the locks securing the platform to our Wyverns._

The catapults rocket forward and shoot us out, and we zoom into the clear, blue, COLD, sky.

"Cherche, any problems with takeoff?" I say into a short radio I'm using (20 meter talk distance) after we climb and level out at a safe (from arrows) height.

"I'm good here." Cherche reports after a brief pause. "Chrom's a little shaken, though."

Chrom also has a radio. "You guys are nuts." His voice actually has a slight quiver to it. "I've flown with the Pegasus Knights countless times, but this was the first time I've felt fear just getting into the air."

"Yeah, that happens a lot." I laugh. "Say'ri, you ok?"

"Yes, yes." Say'ri is comparatively less composed. "I admit, this is my first time flying. I did not expect such speed."

…

Oh, she's screwed.

_We're now furiously cackling. And we forgot to turn off the radio._

"Your demeanor does not fill me with confidence, Lord Ash." Say'ri sounds like I just declared the apocalypse. "Please do mind my inexperience." She sounds pleading.

Regain control, cease insanity. "Yeah, just hold on tight; I won't be maneuvering much…just tell me if I need to make any fine directional adjustments." Deep breath. "Cherche, we'll head to the Mila Tree at full afterburners. You ready?"

"Mhm." Cherche (probably) nods.

_The Cruise Engines come to life with a roar and it very clearly glows red at the end. Say'ri has a heart attack, metaphorically speaking._

I'm grinning like a moron again. "Alright, full powah!"

Our two Wyverns tear through the skies, with our poor, poor riders…well, I won't be surprised if they stop flying forever after this.

…

…

Man, there's a lot of snow beneath us.

Also a lot of villages.

_As we get further from the coastline the snow decreases. The ground is still entirely white though._

I see quite a few forts…probably Valmese. I hope they don't see us. We'll probably need to siege or burn each fort individually as we go inland. I really hope they don't see us.

I applied a coating of the translucency painting (the 'I'm harder to spot if you're not looking' paint) to Magna's underbelly just in case, but…still. Makes me nervous.

…

…

It takes us half a day to reach the Mila Tree…it really is Yggdrasil from up here. It looks like somebody was in charge of making a map, used a satellite image from Google Maps, zoomed out, and then just slapped a cartoon cutout of a tree on that map.

The trunk of that tree has to be a whole city block across.

_We go down from full afterburners and circle around the tree trunk._

"Cherche, do you see anything on the ground?" I ask her.

_While giving Say'ri some gentle pats on the shoulder to calm her down._

"Nothing but roots and water." Cherche replies, mirroring my own observations.

"Alright, Say'ri?" She…probably needs a minute.

_We keep circling until Say'ri gets her brains back in her head._

"The…the entrance of the temple is that way." She gestures weakly with one arm, and we fly over to the indicated entrance at the base of the tree and…can't land, because there's not enough runway.

_The bane of using heavier equipment: STOL techniques._

So instead we fly out a bit, find a fairly flat root, land there, and then (to our co-riders) mercifully walk to the entrance.

Say'ri and Chrom seemed to have regained some of their good mood after dismounting from our Wyverns.

_Magna makes a noise that can only be interpreted as "Pah, humans."_

I pat his neck and go "I know, right?"

…

Say'ri leads us up the spiral staircase.

"This is the first time I've been back here since I was but a mere child." Cherche says happily. "It's good to know that the temple remains intact even with the war raging in my homeland."

"I never thought they'd build a temple in a tree." Chrom notes.

"I'm surprised the tree is still alive." I mutter.

Say'ri laughs. "You three echo the emotions of all who visit the tree." She smiles at us. "I admit I also have not been here in many a month…it is good to make a pilgrimage every now and then, regardless of the politics and strife that plague our lands."

…

Soon enough, we reach the temple area, and a woman in green hair and flowing robe greets us on the threshold of the wide, probably marble courtyard.

A woman with long green hair, an air of serene grace…and is definitely not Tiki.

She bows. "Lady Say'ri, I am honored by your visit."

Cherche makes an "I should know who she is" kind of expression.

"Nagi, it's been far too long." Say'ri returns the bow. "I apologize for intruding at such an hour."

_Nagi?_

Nagi? She looks…she looks like Tiki if Tiki was older and had longer hair. Like… "wups I tripped over my hair" long hair.

"Are these your friends?" Nagi asks Say'ri.

"Ah, as circumstances would have it." Say'ri turns to us.

Cue introductions.

"It's a pleasure to meet you all." Nagi replies politely. "What brings you to the temple today? I imagine it must be a task of grave importance."

"Yes…may we speak to Lady Tiki? It is a matter that requires her attention." Say'ri replies.

T-Nagi has a barest hint of a frown. "I'm afraid it is currently impossible. Lady Tiki is currently predisposed."

…Really now?

_We close our eyes and begin feeling around with magic…a trick we learned from delving deep into Nosferatu._

It's like I'm looking for stuff to eat…but with my mind.

_That is the dumbest explanation._

It is also the most accurate.

I feel…an incredible power from inside the temple. It's lower than expected, probably on a different floor, but it's certainly a power similar to Nowi's. As far as I can tell there's no way to discern the different kinds of Manaketes from each other (granted the only data we could collect was from Nowi and Nah) so that's probably Tiki.

"I see your friend is quite well versed in ancient magic." Nagi says disapprovingly as I open my eyes and exhale slowly. "You should take care to avoid diving so deeply."

"Lest I lose myself? Yeah, I hear that a lot." I respond…maybe a bit more dismissive than I intended. "I'm aware of my limitations, thank you."

"I take it the Lady is within the temple?" Cherche asks.

"Apparently." I nod, glancing at Nagi to judge her response. "If she's praying, we can always wait for her to finish."

"That may be unwise." Nagi replies firmly…and then turns to face the entrance of the main temple structure.

_The temple itself shakes and rumbles._

Shit. "Uh…who did we piss off?" Draw airman rifle, activate wind boots, check spare equipment…all clear.

_Chrom and company draw weapons as well._

"Wait!" Nagi holds a hand to stop us…as the temple doors blast open due to the efforts of a dragon with chains around its body.

_The Dragon roars and blasts the Risen General in its mouth into the tree next to us._

The Risen hit the wall and splatter into pieces, which are then absorbed into the tree.

"Why is there a rogue dragon in the temple?" Chrom asks Nagi, not dropping his Falchion in the face of the Dragon.

_We on the other hand can put two and two together, by virtue of having prior knowledge._

That makes this worse. "Why is Tiki a crazed dragon?" I demand.

"How did…" Nagi looks at us in surprise. "I can answer later. First we must restrain the lady before she runs amok." She adds, taking out her Dragonstone.

Murderous!Tiki sees the shine of Nagi's stone and growls menacingly in response.

…

Not gonna lie. Of all the battles I expected to have fought at the Mila Tree, this was not it.

.

.

.

{ === + === }

Author Notes:

Major props to Guardian54 ( u/1921375/) for bringing the idea of parachutes to the table.

Also this marks the debut of the entirety of Destroyer Group Six. I'm not sure why I wanted to add them in.

_Because they're cute. Duh._

Also also: STOL – Short Takeoff Or Landing. As opposed to VTOL - Vertical Takeoff or Landing.

(Could also be Short TakeOff and/or Landing).


	32. Valm Campaign - Versus Tiki

{ === + === }

…

"So what's the plan?" I ask Nagi. "More importantly, how do we actually stop her?"

"Were Tiki a young Manakete, then simply surprising her would be enough to break her concentration." Nagi replies. "Unfortunately, that is not the case."

Sorry Tiki, you're old.

"In order to pacify Tiki, we must either render her unconscious or remove her Dragonstone." Nagi continues. "Only then will she revert to her human form."

Knocking her out seems like a tall order. "So how do we stop her Dragonstone?"

Nagi…shrugs. "Tiki is far too experienced for something like that."

…

Thanks.

"I shall be using my powers to keep Tiki in check." She continues. "Please take care not to die."

…this is why Robin does our battle plans.

"Chrom, take the left, Say'ri, take the right, Cherche, you're on support." I order. "Don't get overeager and die against Literally Jesus or kill her."

"Who?" Chrom raises an eyebrow. "Are you sure, putting yourself in the center?"

"You two can hit, I can't." I reply…which is true in a sense. I have a sword and my airman rifle, and since my sword skills aren't enough to catch Nowi regardless of if she transforms or not, Tiki would just kick our asses at melee combat forever.

_Up until now, Dragon Tiki has just sat around patiently for us to make the first move._

She growls and observes as Chrom and Say'ri move to flanking positions.

"Hey, Tiki." I say loudly, getting her attention. "I really hope you don't remember this in the future."

_We aim the airman rifle and fire._

…I don't think that did anything. Tiki very clearly reacts to having been struck by a projectile, but it didn't seem to actually hurt.

Crap.

_Tiki counters our piddly rifle with an actual fire breath._

SHIT

_We dodge with our wind shoes and get to witness Tiki blast the hell out of the tree walls._

Hoooo…kay. We have BADLY underestimated how powerful she is.

_Dragon Tiki roars, spreads her wings, and charges towards us._

Fire, fire, fire!

[3rd Person Camera]

Ash backpedals with his wind shoes while firing round after round into Tiki's armored backside.

_Is he avoiding her vitals on purpose? _Nagi mused before activating her own Dragonstone and letting its energy pour through her body.

Ash, feeling the sudden surge of power behind him, immediately veers out of the way, clearing the path for Nagi to slam into Dragon Tiki's head.

"You can be a bit rough with her when she's like this." Nagi notes cheerfully (compared to her usual cool demeanor). "Don't be shy, now."

"Fucking hell." Ash mutters. "Engage! Engage!" He then yells as he fires a few more rounds into Tiki's armored top half.

Chrom and Say'ri take this cue to rush Dragon Tiki while Nagi has her head pinned.

Tiki, in response, whimpers, causing the two to falter for just a moment.

That moment was enough for her to blow them away with her wings. She then kicks down into the ground and grants herself the momentum to toss Nagi clear into the sky with a flick of her neck.

Say'ri smiles despite herself. "The Speaker is no stranger to combat, I see." She then blinks in surprise and leaps away from a stream of fire.

"Well, if you insist." Ash mutters to himself as he aims and fires at Tiki's exposed underbelly. He then gapes in surprise as she blasts the rounds away with her wings. "These are electrically accelerated nails!" He gripes to the air. "She shouldn't be able to see them!"

Technically Tiki's detecting them via small bursts of magic discharged from Ash's rifle, but he has no way of knowing that, so…meh.

Tiki responds to Ash's fire by diving at him with her back claws reaching forth like a bird of prey.

Ash shoots her in the foot before charging underneath Tiki and forcing her to overshoot.

"How are we supposed to fight her if she won't stay aground?" Chrom shakes his head in disbelief, before charging towards Tiki as the airborne Dragon regains her balance.

_Ash shoots Dragon Tiki in the rear for good measure._

Nagi, who was still in the air, drops onto Tiki's back and clambers up to the neck.

Nagi then wrenches Tiki out of the air via suplexing the comparatively larger Dragon onto the ground.

_Does she actually need our help? _Ash couldn't help but wonder.

Dragon Tiki thrashes and Nagi is forced to let her go, but she is unable to make a full escape before Tiki catches her with a powerful swing of her tail, slamming Nagi into the tree wall.

"Were that us, we would be dead." Say'ri notes before unleashing Astra on Dragon Tiki (they came down close to her).

Dragon Tiki beats her away with a wing in retaliation.

"So this is the power of a Manakete…" Chrom grits his teeth and charges with his Falchion.

Tiki, seeing the roaring dude with blue hair rushing forward, jumps into the air and evades Chrom's powerful side swing.

Chrom follows up his attack by spinning with his momentum and unleashing a second swing upwards, catching Tiki's foot and causing her to roar in pain.

Chrom, knowing that this was not simply a dragon, faltered.

So Tiki kicked him.

"She's been through a few scrapes; she won't die just like that." Nagi points out.

"Are we any closer to stopping her?" Ash asks Nagi.

Nagi's reply was cheerfully inconsiderate. "She's getting warmed up, so it might be a few hours."

She didn't catch Ash's incredulous (and somewhat angry) glare.

…

[Allied Forces Landing Point]

…

"What are they doing?"

Nino looks up to see Robin approach. She then looks down at the four girls collapsed on the ground, panting. "They're resting." She says evenly.

"They look like they're dying." Robin gulps. "What…er…"

"Fredrick." Nino said simply.

Robin felt the blood drain from her face even as Fredrick made his appearance. "Lady Robin, I bid you good day." He says cordially.

"What did you do?" Robin couldn't help but ask.

"I did as they requested." Fredrick said proudly. "I must admit, these are some of the most active young women I've ever had the honor of training."

"If only they knew the value of resting." Nino sighs and pats Raiden Junior's forehead.

Robin elected to obliterate this scene from her memory. "Er, right. Nino, Nina said something about training that you guys needed to do with the…uh…ground-pounders?"

"Ground…" Nino looks confused for a second. "Oh! Yeah! Hang on." She turns and bows to Fredrick. "Thank you, Sir Fredrick, for assisting with our training efforts."

Fredrick's smile gave Robin shivers. "Think nothing of it." He said.

"Excuse me!" Nino leaves in a hurry, before stopping suddenly and skidding on the ice. "Robin! You should come watch! Ash says so!" She said while clutching to a small tree for support.

Robin was rightfully confused. "He did? When?"

…

"It is a recommendation of Ash's that you become acquainted with how our command and response structure works, Lady Robin." Ninya explains when Robin posed the previous question to her. "Since you are, as he put it, 'the better tactician'."

"I'm glad he thinks that way." Robin frowns. "But why now?"

"We have simply not had the opportunity to do so until now." Ninya replies. "Some of the Shepherds have deigned to help us with our training as well." She adds.

_Probably Vaike_. Robin thought as she rode with Blackbird One (whose partner had drawn the lucky short stick and got to sleep in for the day).

…

"Alright, Blackbirds are in the air." Blackbird One reports as they flew over the damaged sections of the town. "Ground units, you guys ready?"

"We're ready as always, darlin'." Captain Stephan replies, his men with him on the training grounds.

"The 'bad guys' are ready too." Stahl replies. "Not used to talking to myself all the time, though."

"It takes some getting used to." Ninya chuckles from her perch overlooking the entire block. "Thank you for your assistance today, everyone." She then takes a deep breath. "All units be advised, we will be running an urban combat training exercise in the north-eastern section of the city. All non-essential personnel should stay out of the training area."

"Urban combat? So like close quarters?" Robin asks her rider.

"Yep." Blackbird One replies. "Well, you'll see in a second."

"Blackbirds, are you ready?" Ninya asks.

"Blackbirds are in observation position." Blackbird One pulls out an oversized spyglass. "We're ready whenever."

"Yeah!" Vaike yells loud enough for Stahl's radio to pick him up. "Let's do this!"

"So he says." Stahl sighs. "Go easy on us, will ya?"

_You can replace the next fifteen minutes with "and the Shepherds were systematically shat upon" and it would still be accurate._

The two groups meet in combat within the city section, with the Blackbirds circling overhead and giving tactical information to the units on the ground.

"Wardog, melee element up right." Blackbird One reports.

_Vaike's leading three Fighters on that corridor. _Robin notes. _They'll be meeting Ash's units in 3…2…_

Vaike's squad rounds the corner and is immediately struck by a flurry of practice javelins. (Sticks with cotton balls attached to the supposedly-pointy end).

"Ha! I'm not done yet!" Vaike shakes off the training javelins. "Do better than that!"

"Ok." Captain Stephan grins and slams into Vaike with his large shield, dazing the larger Warrior. Then, with his shield as a fulcrum, Stephan drops to one knee, hoist Vaike up with the shield, and drop him into a nearby snow pile. "Give up?"

"Yeah, yeah…" Vaike grumbles, accepting Stephan's offer to pull him up. "How do you guys fight like that? I can beat you in sparring any day of the week."

"As Ash so helpfully put it: 'You can't fight what you can't see.'" Stephan laughs. "He surprised everyone with this new combat style."

Vaike isn't convinced. "Yeah? Seems to be over-dependent on the tactician to me."

"So I thought as well, but-" Stephan stops to relay orders from Blackbird Two. "The girls in the sky aren't tacticians at all. Just scouts."

"Huh." Vaike muses as the Phoenix Infantry throws another volley of Javelins, pre-empting Miriel's mage corps before they could even attack. "Is that why Robin's up there? To see what an actual tactician can do as a...uh…whatever you guys call them."

"I think his lordship has something else planned for someone as talented as your Robin." Stephan replies. "The Research team back home was working on something big on his orders."

"Still?" Vaike scratched his head. "Doe he ever stop?"

"If he did, we never saw it." Stephan shakes his head before paying attention to another order. "Back left, shield wall."

The Phoenix Infantry forms up into a clustered shield wall as Stahl's detachment rounds the corner. With the cavalry hampered by the need of having to make a tight turn, the Phoenix Infantry slammed into Stahl's cavalry and completely arrested their movement, 'killing' them on the spot.

Stahl, per his status as an armored badass, managed to counter a few Infantry before he was taken down.

"And therein lay our weakness." Ninya sighs. "Captain Stephan, can your men not withstand the might of a Great Knight?"

"Stahl's damn good, Ninya." Stephan replies. "We were never meant to be an anti-cavalry melee unit to begin with, either."

"Oh, really?" Stahl's interest was piqued (even as he shared some really nice tea with the men that 'killed' him). "What are you guys supposed to do in the event of a charge?"

Stephan nods to his men, and they all unhook the crossbows bound to their backs. "We do this." He says simply.

The Phoenix Infantry then pick out an imaginary target (a bag of flour left on the side of the snow-covered road) and quickly organize themselves into their squads of five, before putting bolt after bolt into the sad sack with astounding speed…and lackluster accuracy.

"Yikes." Stahl gulps when the sack was perforated by around fifty bolts. "Will that actually stop a cavalry's armor, though?"

"Not with these bolts, no; we don't use our AP rounds for training." Stephan smiles evilly.

"AP?" Vaike repeats. "What does that mean?"

"Armor Piercing." Ninya jumps in. "Those weapons use are already deadly, even if they don't have the same range as a bow…with the AP Bolts, the Crossbows can break through the toughest armor with the minimal of effort…He describes it as 'Armorslayer two point five'."

_AP Crossbow: 500% damage to armored units were it a game item._

"Whatever that means." Vaike grumbles, before challenging Stephan. "Alright, let's go for another round; winner buys lunch."

"Hope you have your wallet ready, then." Stephan smirks.

"Sounds like Ash knows exactly what he's doing at all times." Robin says, having eavesdropped on the entire conversation due to Stephan's radio.

"Though I'd say it's more like he tries a lot of things and goes with the things that work." Blackbird One giggles. "We're ready for round two anytime, Command."

Ninya nods. "Understood, Blackbirds…Lady Robin, would you like to oversee the operation this time?" She offers.

"Huh? Uh…" Robin wasn't as used to flying for long periods of time as the Blackbird girls, and was already starting to feel fatigue. "Yeah, I'll give it a shot."

"Thank you; command to all practice units, Lady Robin of the Shepherds will be taking command, follow her directions."

"Whaat?!" Vaike shakes his fist into the air. "You come down here and help us instead, Robin!"

But given that he had no headset, his demand was carried off by the winter wind.

…

[Mila Tree]

…

This is extremely stupid.

Well, this is extremely dangerous, but danger is stupid, ergo this is stupid.

_We've been tangling with Dragon Tiki for the past hour; having Cherche on backup means she can swap for one of us if we overextend and Tiki nearly kills us._

She can also heal in a pinch, which is nice, because I ended up in a lot of pinches.

"Is she anywhere near tired yet?" I ask Nagi.

"All signs point to no." Nagi replies evenly while blood flowed down her arm. "This will be detrimental to her health if it continues."

So you've said for the last twenty minutes. Uh…ok. "Cherche, take over."

"As you wish." Cherche readies her poleaxe and advances towards Tiki (we've all gotten past the 'charge at Dragon' portion by now).

"The Speaker is quite the hassle." Say'ri puffs, falling back as Cherche took Tiki's attention. "I cannot imagine the pains we would endure were you not here, Lady Nagi."

Nagi's unflappable tone doesn't change. "My control is steadily slipping…it would be wise if we were to let Tiki regain control soon."

I want to hear Nagi deliver the Presidential Address for the Apocalypse.

Ok, stay focused…I learned a bit about Manaketes and weaknesses experimenting with Nah. Tiki should be stronger so the weaknesses are correspondingly less relevant, but they should still be there.

Weakness Number One: Manaketes need to maintain physical contact with their Dragonstones to draw upon their power. Without that contact, they cannot transform.

_Given that Tiki's a dragon right now…_

Weakness Number Two: While transformed Manaketes experience the T-Rex curse, where their arms are too stubby to be of any use.

_Tiki has proven herself to be much more talented at using her comparatively tiny appendages to utterly wreck our day, so…_

Weakness Number Three: When transformed, the Dragonstone becomes a sensitive weakness of the dragon on the approximately similar physical location, and striking it is the same as a critical hit.

_Nah has her stones secured to her sides, so when she transforms and we hit the sweet spot she acts as if we just poked her sides. Nah's also much less experienced than Tiki, so when we hit her sweet spot (even with just a light tap) it's enough to completely break her transformation entirely._

She's also really embarrassed when we hit her, too…it's cute.

…

In that case, where is Tiki's weak point?

_Nagi has stated that Tiki doesn't have such a weak point._

Only one way to find out.

_We tap our pocket spellbook and flood the area with dark magic, surprising and alerting everybody in the tree._

...so what did I learn? Uh…number one, don't use dark magic in front of Dragon Tiki, because she will lose her shit and try to cremate the fuck out of us. Fortunately it just seems to be a reflex thing, as she's not really aiming and is thus burning her surroundings to the ground, much to the chagrin of Chrom and Cherche. Sorry guys!

_The fire she's breathing doesn't seem to actually catch things on fire. Either that or the Mila Tree can't be caught on fire._

The magic itself is a low-output Flux that covered the entire combat area, and as expected, the area around Tiki repulsed the dark magic with no effort. I don't know if this is because of a Manekete's absurd resistance or if it's because of Tiki's status as a Divine Dragon though.

Either way, what's interesting is that the spot between her tail and her back repulsed more of the magic than everywhere else on her body (except her mouth, but that's probably because it's shooting off a bazillion gallons of fire).

_American fire's measured in gallons; it's measured in liters everywhere else._

I don't have concrete proof that that spot is her weak point, but it's a lot better than trying to out-tire Dragon Jesus.

"Chrom! Cherche! Target the base of her tail! Topside!" I yell, also grabbing Tiki's attention so she can try to selectively burn the fuck out of just us.

Unfortunately Dragon Tiki was still pretty smart, and even as Chrom and Cherche started their charge she took to the air.

_"Please don't do that." Cherche admonishes Dragon Tiki and hurls her poleaxe towards Tiki's tail._

She's got an amazing throwing arm.

_The Poleaxe strikes Tiki's tail (but not at the supposedly weak spot), causing Tiki to lose her balance and grab onto the Mila Tree for support._

"How stubborn." Cherche, now lacking a weapon, is reduced to simply standing there and being angry at Tiki. She even folds her arms.

On the other hand, we now have a clear shot at Tiki's tail.

_Tiki propels herself off of the Mila Tree with a roar._

NOPE NO CLEAR SHOT SHIT SHIT SHIT

DUCK

_Tiki swoops over our head, her claws grabbing at us but missing._

Thank Nagi Tiki's not fighting at full strength. Turn and fire!

_Plink. Hit, but no critical._

Stop moving goddammit wait no don't do that

_Tiki had pulled up when we fired, and now she suddenly folds her wings in and lands hard on the ground, creating a shockwave that blew everyone back._

Mother of fucker…that hurt. She blew us clear across the tree.

…? I feel like the tree drains magic when I touch it.

_Then we should probably stop touching it._

Give me a minute while my lungs restart.

_Like she will._

Shit. Dragon Tiki is coming for a charge again…c'mon, move!

GAH

FUCK

OW

OK

_We scrambled left, but not fast enough; Tiki slams into our left arm and shatters it with a claw._

GOD DAMMIT, TIKI

_We aim our gun at her eye as she glares at us and fire, but Tiki turns her head slightly and cause the shots to hit the armored scales on the top of her head rather than her eye._

_"Chance." Nagi declares and rushes towards Tiki, who is now trying to bite us._

_Nagi, with her hand glowing with power, punches Tiki on the base of her tail._

_Tiki stops trying to bite us…and de-transforms from her draconic state._

Tiki is in her nighties, so she transformed during GAH

_Tiki, now unconscious, slumped against our shattered arm, which was a knockout blow._

…

[Some Time Later]

…

I…

I'm alive?

I feel a gloriously warm bed beneath me.

How am I alive?

This sheet is comfy.

It's bright.

I don't see a light.

There's a roof!

Ok…deep breaths, deep breaths…

…

Is my arm ok?

Uh…

Both of my arms refuse to move.

But they feel warm.

So I guess the nerve endings are ok? Let's try to move the left arm.

…left pinky is reacting to brain. Good. Good…

So what's wrong with my right arm?

My head feels really heavy.

…

Where am I?

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAa

Nope. Head still not moving.

_A for effort._

…

This is oddly excruciating, wow.

Did I hurt my neck at some point?

…I also can't move my mouth. Hrm.

Am I just that tired or something?

Leg…I can move my foot. My spine is probably intact if I can move my extremities like this.

…it's really warm under the covers.

…it feels like there's somebody under my covers. Somebody who's not me.

"Ah, you're awake." I hear a voice…sounds like Nagi.

_Nagi walks into the small room that housed us, our bed, and whatever else is in our bed. She has a potion in hand._

"You must be confused; we needed to paralyze you in order to ensure that your bones repaired properly." Nagi explains. "It seems like it's wearing off a little now...oh."

She lifts the cover.

"So that's where she went." Nagi comments.

I don't need to see who she's referring to know that there's a pretty good chance that Tiki crawled into our bed.

"Now let's help you up…" Nagi says and OWOWOWOWOW

"Or…not." Nagi stops trying to help us up, because Most Likely!Tiki is attempting to break our right arm.

"Here." Nagi uncorks the potion and slowly feeds it into our throat while we have partial control over its flowing rate.

_We choked six times._

"Better?" Nagi smiles.

"Yeah." I sound a tad hoarse, but it's to be expected. "Why's she" I check quickly with my newfound powers of neck motion just to make sure it is, in fact, Tiki (it is). "Why is she here?"

"For various reasons." Nagi says mysteriously before gently shaking Tiki. "C'mon, sleepyhead, stop latching onto him."

Tiki mutters something in her sleep and SQUEEZES TIGHTER

Warning. Warning. Severe damage sustained by right arm.

_Use Doctor's Bag._

Nagi, in the end, needed to peel Tiki away one finger at a time before walking Fire Emblem Dragon Jesus back to her room…fun game, trying to add as many accurate descriptive modifiers to Tiki's title.

_In that time, Chrom, Say'ri, and Cherche had all come to visit._

_Presently, the four of them were gathered in the room I'm occupying, probably in the Mila Tree still)._

"So…uh…" Wow, my arm is entirely red. "What was that all about…actually, no, even before that, why is Tiki going insane?"

Nagi thinks on it for a moment. "I have been informed by Sir Chrom" She nods to him "that you are an extremely astute scholar. Perhaps you'd like to take a guess first?"

Chrom, you're an ass. I see you smirking back there, don't try to hide it behind your glove.

Let's see. Tiki's slow spiral into insanity is first touched upon in Mystery of the Emblem…that's about all I know of it. I assume that it's effectively cured or whatever if the player got the best ending, though.

Well, if we put two and two together, "Does it have anything to do with the Fire Emblem?"

_Chrom seems surprised that we know of it at all, as he doesn't have it with him at this time, and we've never actually seen him use it._

I'm fairly certain that the Fire Emblem is in Emmeryn's procession at the moment.

"Quite astute indeed…or was it simply a lucky guess?" Nagi smiles when I roll my eyes. "As you are aware, Tiki is the Speaker for Naga, and quite possibly the most powerful Divine Dragon currently in existence in the world."

Uh huh.

"As a result, her mental state is closely tied with her connection to Naga."

…erm. "Time out. So she'll go insane if the tie is cut?"

"The opposite." Nagi shakes her head. "The closer she is to Naga, the more unstable her mental state will be."

How?

"Is Naga somehow responsible for her condition?" Cherche asks.

Nagi pauses. "I do not think so." She says after mulling it over. "Tiki's loss of stability is more likely due to the lack of an opposing balance."

Opp… "Grima?"

_Alarmed looks from all the regular humans._

"I do not know." Nagi says evenly. "However, Tiki's condition started to deteriorate 1000 years ago."

So...the Falchion wielder at the time…what, struck down Grima, sealed him for the next millennia, and then Tiki started to go insane?

"Did Tiki lose her mind at the end of the second conflict with Marth?" I ask.

"She did not." Nagi frowns. "The War of Heroes was oft an overlooked part of Akaneia's history."

In other words, 'how did we know about it?' I assume the conflict for Mystery of the Emblem is what she's referring to. It probably is.

Bragging time! "I've built the most comprehensive library in Ylisse…we pick up a few things here and there."

"Is that so?" Nagi smiles…she doesn't believe it for one moment. "I shall visit it one day, then."

Please do. "Non-sequitur aside, how do we stop it?"

"I do not know." Nagi admits. "Though I have my hopes."

…Must suck watching your…whatever their relationship is…go progressively more insane over the course of a thousand years.

"Your hope lies with Ash?" Cherche smiles slightly.

Nagi's response is just a shrug.

…

The door to the room creaks open again, and…

_We grin and hide our face._

Tiki is either the perfect college student or the perfect bachelorette, one of the two: her clothing is all kinds of disheveled, her hair looks like it got into a fight with Medusa and lost, and she in general feels like she needs a tub of coffee.

_There's a weird standoff as all parties stare at one another._

"Um…" Chrom's the first person to make a sound.

"Lady Tiki, are you alright?" Nagi asks politely.

Tiki makes a noncommittal 'I'm not awake' noise. She then bows and says something, but she's way too sleepy to be coherent.

On one hand, utterly adorable. On the other…

"Is this because she's deteriorating?" I ask Nagi after she returns from escorting Tiki back to her bed. "Or does she sleepwalk all the time?"

"Tiki has always been prone to sleepwalking." Nagi nods. "But usually she's more aware than she looks."

…

…

"I suppose asking for the Speaker's help is a moot point now." Say'ri sighs. "Not with her health in such a plight."

"Ash, how's your arm?" Chrom asks me.

"Stiff." I move my left arm a bit. "But it's intact, so it's all good." Hmm. "I still think it would be in our best interest to invite Tiki to go with us, though."

"Even when she's…unwell?" Cherche says.

I nod. "The way I see it, having her go with us gives us two benefits: one, we have Nowi and Nah…and if Nagi chooses to go with, then we'll have a lot of manpower in case she goes berserk again."

Chrom thinks it over. "And two?"

"Two, her condition might improve if she's near Robin." Sorry Robin.

"Why? Simply because of her past?" Chrom growls; he is really papa bear about his Shepherds.

_We're papa bear about our Phoenix, too._

I guess. "Yeah…either her or Tharja…or me, come to think of it." Also, how much does he know about Robin's past? We've established that our Robin has some memories of Grima's involvement.

Cherche gets it first. "You think dark magic will help improve Tiki's condition? Dark magic is not inherently evil…as you, one if its users, should well know."

I know. I just want to get Tiki close to Robin to see if Robin's Grima-ness will help make things better. "Yeah…it's a better alternative than having her waste away, at the very least."

"Do you know the Speaker well?" Say'ri asks us.

Ahahaha "Nope; only what I've read. She looks better than I imagined, too."

_She does. Real Adult!Tiki is stunning…not disparaging Game!Tiki in any way._

…to be fair we've seen her exactly once so far and she wasn't exactly presentable, but…

_So, in other words, she has large breasts._

…yes.

…hey, she pulverized my left arm. I get to stare a little.

…

In any case, we (I needed to sleep off the aftereffects of whatever anesthetic they gave me) spent the night in the Mila Shrine.

…we woke up with Tiki trying to claim our right arm again.

"Why is she doing this?" I feel like I didn't get a decent enough answer.

_It's morning. Nagi's here to pry Tiki from our cold, dead arm._

"Perhaps she likes you." Nagi's smile is a tad creepy…not 'hidden daggers' creepy, just 'I'm not used to smiling' creepy.

"That would be nice, though it looks like she's just really attached to this arm in particular." …my right arm has lost all feeling. How strongly was she locked on to it?

_When did she enter our bed? We were never a super heavy sleeper before and after two years we sure as hell aren't anymore._

…maybe she's just really good at sneaking into and out of places. Three thousand years is a long time to learn some odd talents.

…actually, let's not go down that line of thought.

"Are you alright?" Nagi asks us as we had drifted off into thoughtland.

"Yeah, yeah. Mornings are a bit odd sometimes." I reply. "I think this is one of the better rests I've had in a while." Didn't need to do a midnight walk or anything, too…it's quite nice.

Nagi's weird smile shows up again. "That's nice to hear…what of your plans to involve the Speaker?"

_The others should've talked to her already._

So she's scoping us out? "If possible I'd like Tiki to accompany us."

"And if she refuses?"

_We, with our back coincidentally turned to Nagi, doesn't catch the piercing glare she gave us._

"That sucks, I guess?" I haven't really given it much thought. "But oh well if it happens."

…it feels cold all of a sudden.

"You're an Outrealmer, are you not?" Nagi suddenly asks out of the blue.

…eh, what's the harm? "Yeah. Something wrong?"

"Then…what is that dark aura?"

The what now?

_We turn to face Nagi. She seems more puzzled than worried._

"First I've heard of it. Explain." I demand.

Nagi looks surprised, and Tiki is just starting to stir.

She does eventually give us an answer, though. "I do not know if the force is innate or borrowed, but there is a dark power around you that's independent from the magic you wield."

…HUH.

_"Excuse me." Nagi leaves us to mull it over while she gets Tiki away from us._

…so does that mean Robin's starting to influence us? Has she been influencing us already? Is Robin innocent and is Grima the culprit? Does that mean I'm T-minus whenever until I betray everyone?

_Maybe we just really like olives._

I don't like olives though.

_Point being, wild guessing isn't going to help matters. Robin's needed, and she's a friend._

Go big or go home, huh?

Still, makes me think.

…

_We get up and use our right arm to stabilize against the wall…you know that feeling you get when the blood goes back into a body part and it starts tingling like crazy?_

Wait shit

_We crumple against the wall with our arm tingling like mad for a few minutes._

Fuck

.

.

.

{ === + === }

Author Notes:

It says a lot about what my holiday plans are like when I've made what would usually be a month's worth of updates in a few days.


	33. Valm Campaign - Steiger Fortress Prep

{ === + === }

...

In the end, Tiki decided to come with us. Yay~

She has some demands though: namely, that we do not send her out to fight against humans.

Given that the Future Children have the same reservations (in that they dislike going out to attack flesh and blood troops) we had no objections.

We're going to be doing a lot of combat against the Risen eventually, so she can just chill until it's time to unleash the beast, or something.

_Nagi's staying behind to attend to the Mila Tree._

Our return trip took two days, since we needed to fly slower owing to the increased weight of having Tiki along…not that she's heavy or anything.

The trip itself was pretty nondescript. We couldn't take our time as it was enemy territory, so it was a straight shot home.

_We did end up needing to camp, and that was terrifying._

As expected, we woke up the next day with Tiki strangling our arm again…which is, upon reflection, a much better outcome than waking up to see Tiki as a berserking dragon.

Also, I need one of those things police dogs train with for my arm.

When we got her home, there was an interesting divide even among the Naga worshippers…although it's a divide I feel like I should've expected.

The Valmese natives practically worship the ground she walked on.

The Alliance forces…recognize that she's Hot Sexy Garterbelt Literal Jesus and pay respects accordingly, but otherwise treat her no differently from other priests of the faith.

_Some of them (like us) care more about the 'Hot Sexy Garterbelt' part than the 'Literal Jesus' part._

Nowi and Nah are utterly star struck though, which is interesting. I've asked them why they feel so strongly about Tiki but they don't really know either.

…

"To be honest, I didn't expect Tiki to agree to come along." Robin comments during the debriefing.

I nod. "Makes the two of us…then again, she did say she's not participating in any combat operations."

"That explains it." Robin then looks around for any possible eavesdroppers (we're the only ones in the small Inn room-slash-office) before dropping her tone furtively. "Do you think she's doing what we're doing?"

"Going after the big evil thing in the sky?" I ask. She nods. "Wouldn't surprise me. She's probably more aware about whatever godly things are going on than we are."

Plus, she brought the…Starsphere? Vert? Are the two the same thing?

_Is it even the Starsphere?_

I have no idea but I'm going to assume it is, since the formation of the Starsphere is pivotal to keeping her sane.

…in that sense, the Starsphere didn't seem to do its work too well in the past few centuries, did it…

Robin notices my attention slipping. "About the fact that she's unstable," she regains my attention via returning to normal volume. "She's not going to go crazy and kill us, is she?"

Uh…"She might?"

_Robin gives us a sharp glare._

Hey, I have my reasons. "I figure that if she goes insane Nowi and Nah can restrain her well enough. Also, she seemed to gravitate to me for some reason when she's asleep, so I think there's something worth investigating there."

Robin's eyebrow goes up. "You sure it's not because she likes you?"

Well now. "I hope that's the case, though more likely it's due to whatever is making me more and more evil."

"Dark magic?" She frowns.

I nod. "Something to that effect. I didn't get any clear answers from Tiki, but I'm going to assume you're involved somehow." I also asked Nagi as well, but eh.

She...sulks? "Just because I have its blood in my veins doesn't make me evil." It's pretty obvious she's not taking offense to my statement though.

"You're too adorable to be evil." I laugh. "In all seriousness though, I don't understand why she's latching to me; if she does the same to you then it'll be a little bit more clear, but for the time being…"

Robin nods. "We'll keep an eye on her, don't worry."

_'We' being the Shepherds._

"Appreciate it."

…

…

Having Tiki around is nice, but there's still a war to wage.

About a week after we returned to the landing point, the weather stabilized (nippy, but sunny) and we were able to resume combat operations.

Correction: we finally had an immediate objective to go after rather than "Let's kill Walhart eventually".

Robin made the decision for a small, mobile force consisting of roughly 500 men to advance down South deeper into Valm's more volatile territory.

_The force itself is comprised of cavalry and light infantry, with Ylissean Cavaliers and Paladins being the core and the Feroxi Warriors being the awesome, with rebel forces making up the quantity of the army rather than the quality._

Her goal is to strike at the Valmese presence within those territories and let the other rebel factions in the region flare up, which would weaken Valm further and give us more operational freedom. It would also allow the other rebel factions to ally with us per our status as an elite anti-Valm force…which is, I suppose, the reasonable alternative to not having Tiki on our side.

_Again, living with us is not the same as actively supporting our war goal. If we were to insinuate that Tiki supports us and she objects, Valm can spin it in the favor and we'll lose support…which is why we've been pretty vocal about Tiki not participating in any operations._

To that end, the Halloween Squadron (plus some support staff and more than a few carts' worth of munitions) will be accompanying the strike force.

_The detachment leaders will be Basilio and Flavia, with Lucina acting as the tactician and Virion as the strategist. We think Lucina is going to avoid Basilio's post chapter 17 heroic sacrifice, and Virion…is going to avoid any more flare-ups between him and the Rosannite citizenry within our current city._

For our side, we set Halloween One as the lead, as she's a good enough leader and manager by her lonesome.

…

While the detachment force goes to wreck house, the primary force's job is to sweep a progressively larger area of any Valmese presence and establish ourselves as the Good Guys™ to make our jobs easier in the long run. It would also attract Valm attention up here and slow their response time to our detachment.

_Robin at this point knows about the Chapter 17 objective, the fortress, and has decided against attacking it at the moment._

Compared to the game, the Valmese army is a lot more mobile, and the fortress isn't guarded by like 40 people we can clear out in a matter of a few turns. If they decide to hole up for a siege then there's very little we can do.

The Phoenix Company's armor piercing capabilities end at lightly reinforced positions. We can't pierce anything heftier than reasonably thick wood, and the chapter 17 fortress is stones all the way.

Thus we're just flying around bombing exposed shit.

_So business as usual._

Yes.

…

…

[3rd Week into our assault]

…

…

Per Robin's orders, we've been driving in deeper and deeper into Valm-controlled territory with our strikes to hit key Valm hardpoints…which is a nice way of saying "hey I see you guys walking on the roads. It would be a shame if something were to happen to you".

_Which in itself is a nice way of saying 'We bombed the fuck out of exposed and unexpected people'._

It seems to be a little different today, though.

"Boss, I see a lot of archers down there." Rafale One reports. "I guess they knew we were coming."

Only took them three weeks, too. "Roger that. Flight, watch yourselves on sweep and don't dive too low." Acknowledgements all around… "Ok…bring out the Rotaries, let's get this started."

_Remember the triple-barrel guns we occasionally use on soft targets? The Rotary is just that but slightly improved (it's lighter and has a better stock so the girls can use it with a single hand)._

…

[3rd Person Camera]

…

The Valmese column on the dirt road was primarily a supply convoy with a fairly substantial infantry escort comprised of mostly levy infantry (Villagers but a lot less well-paid) and archers.

"They sent a lot of us just to protect one convoy." One of the levies grumbles. "What are they so afraid of?"

His friend elbows him. "Didn't you hear? The rebels have some stupidly good Pegasus Knights and Valm's losing to them left and right."

Levy NPC glances at the wagon next to him. "So if those knights came, we'll be able to get away with these goods, huh?"

"I'll run you down myself if you try it." His commander officer snaps. "Now shut up and keep your eyes open, the captain thinks we're going to be hit soon."

"Yeah?" Levy NPC stares upwards. "I don't see anything…"

A second later, the front of the column was in an uproar.

"Uh." The Levy NPC gapes as men and horses fell to whatever the hell was hitting them. "The hell is this bullshit?!"

Fortunately his friend had his head in the right place and quickly dragged Levy NPC off of the path and away from the path of invisible destruction. From their position, they watched as the column was systematically eradicated via invisible attacks launched from the suddenly appearing Pegasus Knights in the sky.

And then their bodies exploded and they died.

…

[1st Person Camera]

…

Slight pity to the two guys that ran off to the sides, but they really shouldn't have separated from the wagons.

Then again we're burning the hell out of the wagons, so I guess they made a good enough move…didn't stop them from getting their limbs shot off, but hey.

Ultimately, despite their archers, our translucent blue-painted armor stopped the vast majority of their archers from doing anything substantial.

"Alright, sweep over, good job, girls." I declare as we go across the end of the convoy line. "Blackbirds, see anything interesting?"

"Nothing, boss." Blackbird One responds. "No reinforcements inbound."

Nice. "Alright; all units split and commence bombing. Burn it to the ground."

I get some…disturbingly cheery acknowledgements in reply.

I'm not turning these girls into pyromaniacs, am I? I'm not, right?

…

Wait a second.

_We stare down at the column of wagons while the girls lob incendiaries upon the wagons of…_

…Building materials? That's a lot of stone and wood. Do people usually move building materials during winter?

_Can't see why…it's a lot of food and manpower being used for a stupid fucking reason™._

…Unless they were planning on building something at the end of the line? "All units hold fire. What are we bombing?"

"It was a food convoy, right?" Blackbird One answers hesitantly. "It's going to the various garrisons on this road."

"Rafale Two here. The wagons at the front are food carts."

"Gripen Leader. I see wood bundles in the middle carts." She's observing the same area I am. "These don't look like anything I'd use to build a house though."

"Yeah, they're really skinny." Another girl agrees. Probably Gripen Two.

_The two of them look like the Izumi sisters (from Lucky Star). It's cute._

They're also really damn accurate at dropping bombs now.

"Tomcat Three. The rear wagons are stocked with food…it's also on fire and smells pretty good." I can hear her sigh. "I'm hungry now."

Hmm. This has 'trap' written all over it.

_To be fair the construction materials can also be used to reinforce the garrisons._

Valm isn't exactly lacking in stone and wood, and stone usually should be going the other way, y'know, from the mountains downwards to the outer skirts, not the other way around.

_We're not geologists._

…yeah, I'm calling it.

"All aircraft pull out." I order. "Reform into squadrons and move. Blackbirds, get above the clouds and stay out of sight."

"Boss?" Rafale One sounds confused. "I think you're overreacting."

I agree, but at the same time. "We're bugging out, that's an order."

"Well, I'm not gonna complain about a shorter work day." Gripen One says cheerfully. "Roger that, boss."

_We as a flight rise higher into the air and begin heading back the way we came._

The reason why I'm skittish is simple: all it takes for the Phoenix Squadron to lose its combat effectiveness is a single bad engagement. We're Little Red Riding Hood and all it would take for the wolf to get us if we were a step too slow getting back home one time out of a hundred.

Blackbird two suddenly chirps in. "What the…Boss, Wyverns are coming out from the woodwork."

_We twist our necks to look._

If the wagon train was moving north, then the west side of the convoy is where the woodwork is located. It's not a large forest, so I figured that the trees wouldn't be able to hide a large aggress oooh holy shit am I wrong

"That's…a lot of Wyverns." Rafale One says faintly. "Boss? That's a lot of Wyverns."

"I can see that." How many are there…a hundred? Two hundred? It's like a swarm of flies coming after us. "All units drop unused ordnance. All Pegasi Knights go at full afterburners. Wyvern flight, shell formation, cover their retreat."

Our Pegasus Knights with full afterburners can outrun a stock Wyvern Knight on a good day. If they're devoting a few hundred Wyverns to kill us then we can be sure that they're not hitting us with just their stock Wyvern Knights.

"Blackbird One here." I hear…she's still over our heads? Good girl. "There are more Wyvern...Lords. Wyvern Lords on your flanks, approaching at high speed!"

Wyvern Lords have slower cruising speeds than Wyvern Knights (heavier armor) but they have burst speed…all things considered, they're going to be coming after us with burst speed.

They're going to catch us.

"All units, rifles out, prepare to intercept, but do not get bogged down!" I order.

We _really _pissed them off over the past weeks, haven't we?

"Boss, there's a small…really fast something headed towards you from behind." Blackbird One then adds. "It's really, really fast."

Eh, we're already being chased by a few hundred. What's a few more?

"Crap crap crap!" Blackbird Two suddenly says. "Where did they come from?!" Reassessment: that sounds like Blackbird Two's other rider.

Also. "What's going on?"

"Wvyerns in front of you!" She yells. "Approaching at high speed!"

…

Fucking hell. Really?! Really, Walhart?!

They're throwing everything they have at us! Ok, shit, I need to calm down. What are my options?

_Blow past the intercepting Wyvern Knights and keep running. The instant we get bogged down and caught, we die._

"Blackbirds, keep at high altitude and retreat, we don't need any more support and we don't have the power to spare for intercepts. Everybody else rise to cruising altitude. Keep your eyes open and forward; don't worry about the ones behind us."

"This is really bad, isn't it?" One of the other girls whisper into her mike…they keep forgetting to turn them off when it matters the most. "If they get us, we're not going to make it."

Yes, miss morale drainer, now shut up about it…except in more diplomatic terms. "Fly fast, fly hard, and shoot straight. We'll make it out alright."

"Yes sir." The girl replies, sounding a little bit reassured.

_We pull up some._

There they are…wow that's a lot of Wyverns. I think they sent a good thousand Wyverns at us.

"Oh dear Naga that's a lot of them." Blackbird One says in a really small voice. "They're like water from all the way up here." I then hear her shiver, because they're actually beyond their winter flight ceiling right now. "Don't die, guys!"

_The Wyverns coming towards us are coming very quickly towards us._

I can't tell if she's optimistic or sarcastic. "All guns forward…fire!"

…

[3rd Person Camera]

…

After the first week of the Phoenix Squadron going full tilt killing everything they can find, Walhart had issued a general command: all available air elements are to converge upon the attackers and kill them down to the last man.

Since the stock Wvyern Rider doesn't have a cruise engine (and thus has a smaller effective range) it took them longer to gather an overwhelming force than previously expected. Thus, the current 800 Wyvern Riders (and 60 Lords) were a large, but certainly not total, part of the Valmese air force.

_Their land armies, due to the Phoenix squadron's harassment, were cooped up in their forts awaiting supplies._

Most of the Wyvern Riders by now are aware that the Allied forces have some overwhelmingly powerful air force and were ready to engage it in battle, but they did certainly scoff at having to field a 20 to 1 advantage in order to achieve victory.

The Valmese task force was split into three units: one chasing, one flanking, and one intercepting.

The intercepting had volunteers who were the most confident in their ability and the overwhelming field presence of their numbers. Upon seeing the Pegasus Knights running in their direction, they funneled into a somewhat compact cone so that their enemies would be unable to simply punch through and escape.

This was standard operating procedure for air-to-air combat charges (as it was similar to how cavalry charges on the ground worked).

Normally this isn't a problem, as there are very rarely enough air units operating in an area for a massed charge to occur, but this time the Valmese Knights can feel the strength of their charge backed by the roar of the Wyverns and the wind in their ears. The elements in the front were looking forward to striking down and taking the enemy knights with them, even if it put their own lives at risk.

I guess the point I'm trying to make here is: massed charges are cool until the other side has guns.

With a slight adjustment to their formation to give all of their units a clear line of sight, the Phoenix Squadron laid a barrage of fire upon the charging Valmese cone and stopped the charge dead in its tracks.

Given that said charge was in the air, it meant that the rest of the front of the cone needed to break off in various directions or be caught in the sudden air collision. For a brief moment, it looked as if the stream of Wyvern riders had broken upon a rock, scattering as they were in all directions.

Ash was expecting a different result. "So much for hoping they'd just crash and burn." He growls.

The rest of the Wyvern Riders were trained well enough to resume their attack. As the Phoenix Squadron flew above them, the Wvyern Riders rose up as one, their cone now a long line reaching up to intercept the actually-really-difficult-to-see-from-below-Pegasus Knights.

The Riders also had the sense to spread out more in order to avoid whatever weapon the Pegasus Knights were using to take them down.

It helped them…a little. Fact of the matter is, the Phoenix Squadron was only interested in getting the hell away from here, and thus every time Valm took a step back due to the barrage of fire it only meant that the Phoenix gets a better position.

_For example: by being above the Valmese forces and being forcibly outside skirmishing range, Valm can't throw javelins because of gravity._

"Get above them! Get above them!" A Valmese captain yells while pulling into the steepest climb he can manage.

"We're at our limits here!" His lieutenant snaps as his Wyvern drops back down to a lower altitude to avoid stalling out and losing control. "Damn! I told them flying here at full speed was a bad idea!"

_Can birds stall? I feel like they can._

The captain stares daggers at the enemy Pegasus Knights flying serenely with their wings partially outstretched. _They look like they're driving straight. That doesn't even make sense. _He thinks. "Climb to their altitude and toss javelins! Don't try to get under them!"

…

"Look alive, they're shooting!" Ash yells into his radio. "AA to the right! Pegs watch the left! Shift our lines!"

_AA = Anti-air, also known as the Wyvern component of the Phoenix squadron._

…

"Are you serious?!" The Valmese captain gapes as his enemy changed formations without a single overt signal. "Pah, forget it! Everyone! Go go go!" His Wyvern breathes a gout of flame to act as the signal to attack.

His contingent of Wyvern Riders (the captain himself was a Wyvern Lord) climbed up near vertically with all of their strength and ended their climb being a fair distance higher than the escaping Phoenix. With the few seconds of advantage they held, all of the riders tossed their javelins with as much strength as they can muster in the cold winter air.

The captain's eyes then widened in disbelief as his enemies banked left, away and up from the incoming javelins, and the Valmese missiles sailed uselessly towards the ground.

"Goddamn." His lieutenant breathes. "What manner of tactics are these?"

He never got the chance to find out.

"Counterfire! Take them down!" Ash roars, and his Wyvern knights bank right and back down again.

The Valmese captain caught a glimpse of the tube-like things his enemies were holding, before feeling something strike his Wyvern and strike the barding.

He then realized (based on the cries around him) that his flight was being eradicated from the sky due to the enemy's counteraction.

"Dive! Dive! Dive!" He yells frantically, throwing up sparks as signal. What's left of his unit dove, using the falling bodies of their comrades as shields against the god-knows-what that's currently being used against them.

The captain himself then felt something heavy strike his back and unseat him. As he twisted in the sky, he saw his Wyvern panic and chase after him. He then saw his Wyvern spasm as it was struck.

The captain then saw his Wyvern fly down past him and instinctively reached out to grab its reins, allowing himself to remount despite the falling bodies around him. He then chanced a look to his left, and saw that his friend's wings were punctured and trailing blood.

"Goddamn you're persistent." Ash growls, still targeting the falling captain with his rifle, "props to you for stubbornness, I guess." He then observed the battlefield a little bit. "More of them coming from the left. Shift formation left, we're not out of the woods just yet."

The Valmese Captain, on the other hand, was quickly shedding the armor from his friend as his friend tried frantically to reduce speed while coming down.

"Oh…not bad, not bad at all." Ash mutters. "Too bad you're a sitting duck…sucks to be you today."

The Captain heard his friend cry out in pay and twisted to see his other wing punctured.

_You monster! _The captain thought through his anger, turning to see who shot his friend. The last thing he think he saw was a small dark something zip directly towards his eye.

…

And so it went for a good twenty minutes. Ultimately, Valm's lack of cohesive aerial combat protocols (which is par for the course as far as the FE universe is concerned) screwed them over. Like practically all aerial forces, Valm's Wyvern Riders were far more suited to skirmishing and striking against land units rather than an all-out air to air brawl, and against the drilled and incessant interception fire thrown their way, Valm's chain of command collapsed and their air units were reduced to flying solo operations against the fleeing enemies.

That being said, the Valmese individual units were still reasonably strong, and it wasn't as if they didn't know what air to air combat _was_, and thus the Valmese forces chased the Phoenix Squadron relentlessly despite having attacks that were, at best, non-effective.

_Damn, this is getting bad. _Ash thought. _Going_ _full afterburners with the cruise engines is draining enough, and we have to keep fighting on top of this…_

To some extent, that was the Valmese Backup Plan. Originally they had expected to intercept the Pegasus Knights, as they were slower and weaker in a straight melee (different levels of experience be damned). However, failing that, their next plan was to use their overwhelming numbers and run the enemy ragged before either forcing them to surrender or wiping out the hopefully more tired enemies.

Unfortunately the stress and panic of the combat situation caused the Phoenix to lose steam much faster than anticipated. The Valmese Wyvern elements, realizing this, allowed themselves to slow down to match the Phoenix's speed in order to give themselves time to rest and maneuver.

Valm has learned very quickly that flying straight at the Phoenix is a Really Bad Idea.

Ash grits his teeth. "This sucks…Blackbirds, are you still in range?" He waits for a few seconds and receives no response. "Ok, good, at least they're out." He mutters. "How are we all doing?"

"Boss, I'm at my limit." Tomcat One pants.

"Hold out for a little bit longer." Ash replies tersely.

"Boss, we can hold the flight for about five more minute at this rate." Rafale One adds with labored breathing. "We can't keep looking back at our tails like this."

_Damn. _Ash looks around for a solution. "Alright, new plan: all aircraft ascend to maximum cruising range and break off all engagements. I'll run cover, so focus on getting home safely."

"What?!" Tomcat One is indignant.

"You girls go home, I'll handle the rest." Ash says with the tone of someone chiding very small children.

Cherche laughs. "Don't worry, girls. I'll bring our beloved captain back home safe and sound."

Despite her tone, the flight knew that Cherche had just given a direct order.

"Right, right…" Rafale One grumbles. "I'll never forgive you if the two of you die for us."

…

The Valmese Theatre commander blinks in surprise as two of the Wyverns broke off from the rest of the flock climbing higher.

"Sir, the enemy has sent a decoy element." His lieutenant reports.

"I can see that." The commander snaps. "What a disgrace." He then growls to himself. "Against a unit not even a tenth our size, we've lost over a hundred riders! And they're going to get away from us!"

His lieutenant just rolls her eyes.

"Have all units fan out and prepare to climb; ignore the decoy element, they're not important." The captain snarls. "I'll teach them what it means to poison our skies."

"I don't think we can reach that high though." His lieutenant mutters.

…

[1st Person Camera]

…

It looks like they're splitting into two elements to our left and right. They're probably not falling for the fact that we're decoys…I don't think it's very normal for the captains to run decoys, so I can't blame them.

_And yet, here we are._

So how should we approach this? My flight's current issue is that, with high flight they can fly for a long time but not very fast. It is entirely possible for the enemy Wyverns to shadow our flight until we hit our temporary airbase and then kill us while we're tired.

Also it would compromise our temporary air base and get everybody killed, which would be problematic.

Thus, I need to ensure that my flight gets out of here safely and that the enemy does not run us down.

So what are my options?

_We can try to decimate the enemy ranks. If we kill at least 10% of them they should start paying attention to us._

_Alternatively, we can do an alpha strike on the enemy commander and throw their chain of command awry further._

…we should probably do a combination of both. Hit the enemy leader and tear through their ranks hard enough that the rest become too scared to continue the chase.

Considering the amount of damage we've done so far, their morale should be pretty close to the breaking point. If I let them recover, they will…so let's strike them hard.

_We switch to our short range radio._

"Cherche? I plan to do something stupid and insane."

Cherche is unfazed. "Sounds familiar…are you planning to charge their commander?"

God I love her. "Yep."

She sighs lightly. "I'll be on your wing, Ash. Minerva, too."

"Glad to hear it." I take a calming breath, and start scanning the sky beneath me for what looks like a commander Wyvern.

…It's probably the guy with the flowing red cape and really shiny armor.

_He's flying pretty low; odds are he will see us if we suddenly dive at him._

And given the formation of the…actually, there are hundreds of Wyvern Knights spread out like a cloud. If we charge at them they WILL respond to us.

"Ok. Cherche? See that super-bright guy down there with the red cape?"

"Oh, it's Sir Pompous." Cherche says with the tone of recognition. "He's still around?"

Wait, it's a legitimate name? "Sir Pompous?"

"Ah…yes. He's a fairly prominent freelancer captain in Valm." Cherche replies. "He's a little like you, always interested in making aerial battles more unfair for the other side."

Huh.

"We call him Sir Pompous because he takes great care in making his armor glisten." Cherche adds. "He uses it to both denote his station as a commander…and to attract attacks onto himself, so as to better lay ambushes. He's pretty good."

So we're about to walk right into an ambush?

"And yes, it means you were about to fall for his simple plan." Cherche says. I can just imagine the smile on her face.

"Well, that's good. Let's completely obliterate his worldview on how combat works." I stretch my neck (by cracking it). "Putting down the charge shield, get ready to charge on my order."

"As you command, captain." Cherche returns to her serious mode.

_The charge shield is the same one that Robin used to cover her flanking tactic when we first took the city._

We can't make one as large as Robin, but it's large enough to just cover the two of us…I just need to time it right so we get right on Pompous's blind spot.

…

And…now.

_We throw down the shield._

"Dive, dive, dive!"

…

[3rd Person Camera]

…

Sir Pompous the enemy commander saw a puff of smoke from one of his men, denoting that they were about to fall under attack.

Sir Pompous the enemy theater commander looked up and saw nothing but blue sky. He briefly debated about the authenticity of the warning before deciding that it was better to be safe than sorry.

Sir Pompous severely underestimated the acceleration provided by the cruise engines and was unable to move away from the diving Wyvern Knight suddenly appearing above his head.

Sir Pompous's decades of combat experience allowed him to move his poleaxe to defend even before his mind processed the fact that he was under attack, and Ash's ambush strike was entirely deflected as Sir Pompous's block redirected the entirety of the strike.

_Damn, he's good. _Ash thought as Magna pulls out of the dive. He looks behind him to see Cherche level out of her dive slightly so she can engage Pompous in an actual melee, instead of doing the single hit-and-away Ash pulled off.

"Lady Cherche." Pompous growls. "So this is where you ran to."

Cherche, hard-pressed to defend against the 50-something year old man's strikes, didn't reply. She probably didn't hear him over the sounds of the two axes clashing in the air, but it's the thought that counts.

"Considering your temperament, I do not believe that you are the commander of this attack…" Sir Pompous spares a glance to home in on Ash's position. "So the idiot must be him."

With a great swing that unbalanced Cherche, he and his Wyvern suddenly dove towards Ash even as the Outrealmer pulled back up.

However, once again his inexperience against the cruise engine worked against him. Sir Pompous's downward cleave would've ended Ash's career right then and there, but the increased speed of the cruise engine caused the attack to miss cleanly. Not to be fazed by a mere miss, Sir Pompous zipped after Ash as the other Valmese Wyverns in the area turned from their chase to assist their commander.

_Okay, that went to hell in a handbasket. _Ash thought. _So now…I can just shoot him, actually._

Ash pulls out his airman's rifle and then made a realization: any underhanded attack against the commander will cause the rest of the enemy units to frenzy. If he was going to establish dominance he would need to do something else first.

"Careful, Ash, he's right on your tail." Cherche warns him through the radio. "He's one of the best knights in Valm, don't let your guard down!"

"Not exactly filling me with confidence, Cherche." Ash replies as he pulls a sharp turn to throw off his chaser: it doesn't really work. "What about the rest of them?"

Cherche glances upwards. "About half are diving after us. The other half is still chasing the main flight."

_Good enough. _Ash thought. "Ok…Magna? We're gonna do _that_." He pats his Wyvern's neck.

Sir Pompous, with his poleaxe extended, is suddenly surprised by the Wyvern he's chasing suddenly upright as if skating on the air.

_Pugachev's Cobra? _Sir Pompous thought. _How does he know a move like that?_

His surprise and sudden insight cost him the momentary second that would have given him a free swing at Ash. As such, the two traded positions and now Ash was behind Sir Pompous.

Wasting no time, Ash levelled his airman's rifle at the enemy commander and fired as rapidly as his hand-loading would allow.

Sir Pompous, realizing that he was under attack even before the first bullets struck, started evasive maneuvers to give Ash worse aim.

It was a moderately effective: while Ash was able to take him out of his active combat role, his life wasn't in any immediate danger.

"Got him." Ash grins. "Cherche, are they panicking yet?"

Cherche pulls up next to him. "They're more angry than panicked, but there's definitely a loss of structure. If we're going to make our breakaway, now would be a good time."

Ash breathes in relief. "Alright. We'll skim the grounds and run at full speed. They're all looking at us, right?"

"They'll be on our heads pretty soon."

_Yay, but also not yay. _Ash thought. "Good for us in the end, I suppose."

Cherche was about to agree, before she felt something pass underneath them. She looked to make sure, but didn't see anything. Not one to leave things to chance, however, "Ash? I think something went underneath us." She says to him.

Ash takes a look and sees nothing of interest…namely, no shiny barding. "Really? I don't see anything…"

_No barding, fast speed, cover against high altitude enemies. _Cherche checks off in her mind. _It has to be. _"Ash, we should fly higher."

"We're going to run right into the Wyvern Knights if we do that." He points out. "You sure?"

"Yes. If I'm right, it means we're fighting against Gryphon Knights."

Ash blinks in surprise. "Really now?" He mulls it over for a moment. _Well, if Cherche of all people consider meeting a Gyphon rider to be a worse alternative to running into a flock of Wyverns… _"Ok, we're pulling up."

A blur on the edge of Cherche's vision, however, told her that the opportunity was lost.

Ash became aware of the Gryphon charging at him from outside of his field of vision only after it had already screeched its attack. He twists his head around sees the beast of prey zooming at him at a frankly absurd speed. Ash, however, did have an easily accessible firearm, and he pointed it in the direction of the charging knight and fired.

While the Gryphon couldn't react to the electrically accelerated rail, it could see very clearly that the item being pointed in its face was a weapon, and moved to evade even before Ash's finger properly depressed the trigger.

Thus he misses. To his immense surprise, the Gryphon, despite having needed to evade in a fairly awkward fashion, didn't seem to lose any speed and closed in, its rider poised to strike with his poleaxe.

Cherche, with a burst of speed from her engines, met the attacker's axe with hers and stopped Ash from having his face forcibly removed from his skull.

Her swing was much shallower and her guard was blown back by the force of the enemy's strike. The enemy Gryphon then slashes Cherche across the chest with one of its claws. She partially manages to block the strike with the haft of her poleaxe, but the haft is torn to pieces as a result.

Minerva breathes fire in retaliation against the Gryphon, setting it on fire and forcing it to separate.

Cherche tosses the rest of her poleaxe at the enemy as Ash taps his pocket spellbook.

One side effect of the enemy attack: the two of them have completely lost their speed while still underneath the cloud of Wyverns.

"Cherche! You ok?!" Ash asks/demands.

"I'll live." Cherche grits her teeth. "But my clothes are ruined." She pops open a Vulnerary and takes a gulp.

The Gryphon had cut into her stomach, so she's understating the damage.

"The Valmese are coming down over our heads." Cherche says to get Ash's head screwed on right. "What do we do, captain?"

"Get underneath me." Ash commands, his voice unusually cold.

…

"Er…captain?" One of the hovering Valmese Knights asks hesitantly. "What spell is that?"

His captain couldn't tell, as it was a spell circle he…wait, nevermind, "It looks like a Nosferatu? But what's with this absurd casting radius?" The captain mutters. "Break off the charge; we'll try again later."

He and about four of his knights broke off from the flood of fifty knights still charging head-on at the circle.

He watched as the knights are engulfed in the spell.

Nothing happened for a few seconds, and then almost as one the charging knights broke off of their attack.

Then the Valmese captain looks on in worry and fear as the knights seemed to have devolved into anarchy and begun fighting each other, giving time for their two targets to escape.

…

…

[1st Person Camera]

…

That? That was fucked up.

Shit.

We've managed to separate from the entirety of the Valm air power, and…Cherche is lagging behind.

_We slow down to match her speed._

She pre-empts me asking questions. "What did you do back there, Ash?"

Uh.

"Siege spell." I reply. "Their morale was shot, their leader was out of the picture, it was a good time to do it."

"I realize that." She snaps. "What spell was it?"

…I take it she's not too fond of what the spell did.

"It's a spell about false positives." I explain. "Basically it causes false positives in the target's body, so they either see things that don't exist or hear things that aren't there."

The spell is basically an attack on the nervous system. About the only thing I know of the nervous system is that it sends pulses that are electrical, so the spell just overloads the nerves with signals and hope something good happens.

_In the case of the Valmese Knights: poor morale plus false positives in their senses means immediate panic and confusion. Odds are they regained their bearings very quickly, but the few minutes are more than worth it._

Cherche is silent for a minute. I think she's mad at me.

"For what it's worth, I figured that they would at least be confused. I didn't think it would devolve into a full out melee."

She doesn't reply.

…She's still ok, right?

_Minvera is freaking out._

So no, Cherche is no longer in control. Shit.

"Magna, get Minvera's attention; keep her from getting distracted."

_He does, allowing Minerva to focus on flying straight and tow Cherche back home._

…

We reach the temporary airbase and do a headcount.

_Everyone's alive, safe and well._

Cherche is unconscious due to her internal injuries. Good thing we had healers on base to stop her from dying outright, but we'll be keeping her under supervision until we're sure she's ok.

_No word on if she approves of our siege spell._

"What do we do now, captain?" Rafale One asks during our post-action debriefing.

"We're going home." I say readily.

"It's not because Lady Cherche was injured, was it?" Blackbird One asks with a suggestive glance.

I laugh lightly. "I would just be sending her flight home if it was. No, Valm has changed their tactics, and we can no longer move carelessly as a result." Plus, I got some heavy thinking to do. "Pack up our gear, we move out at dawn."

…

…

…

After that, we didn't get into too many more tussles with the Valmese Knights, which really isn't a problem in itself.

The problem is that they're zoning us.

Up to now we've operated by hit-and-run tactics. We show up, do our bombing thing, and then leave.

With the Valm pulling what feels like every Wyvern they have just to fight us, we no longer have the luxury of staying and fighting. I mean, hell, the only reason we got away the first time around was because they underestimated our cruise engines.

_Up to now we've made sure to never use the engines for anything other than counterbalancing the weight of the bombs._

Now that they have a good grasp on what our engines can do, we won't have nearly as much of an advantage with our equipment.

So, about the zoning. With the Valmese air units active within our general area, and, more importantly, with those Gryphon Knights being just faster than we are, Valm is at a good position to strike and kill us at their leisure. Fortunately for us, they're not doing that.

Instead, they shadow our movements and stay outside of our engagement range. Can we shoot at them? Yeah. Can we actually hit them? Not really. With the Gryphon knights marking us, we can't move nearly as freely as before.

The end result is that we lose a lot of operational area because we're just not big enough to soak any losses we will end up taking if we go in for a furball. I mean…hell, Cherche went down and we as a flight immediately got worse during dogfights.

_Plus, these are quite possibly the same knights we will need to fight Grima. The less we kill the better._

But the ground units are fair game. We are not very morally upright, are we?

_Though it's not like we're actively refusing to kill their air elements…_

…

I need to go back to my lab for a few days. It's not as if I was purposely reducing our strike capabilities before, but right now I need more.

We need the ability to engage in a stupidly bad engagement and _win_.

…

[Two weeks after that clusterfuck]

…

"Still nothing?" Robin asks us as we dismount.

I shake my head. "I think we've reached the maximum capacity for what we can do with just air strikes…how's Cherche?"

Robin sighs. "She's not happy about being confined to her bed, but until she stops throwing up her food, she doesn't have much of a choice."

_Apparently there are side effects to being healed out of serious damage._

Just happy she's ok. "Still, huh? Dammit."

Robin playfully punches my shoulder. "Are you worried about her? Or are you worried about not having her?"

"A little from column A, a little from column B." I reply with a small grin. "Got any news from our detachment?"

We sent one of our warships to act as a liaison for the land unit and to act as a gun battery if things go badly.

"They've managed to break Valm in another province three days ago." Robin says. "It's going smoothly for them. Having the Hibiki in the region was a touch of genius, if I do say so myself."

_Robin told us to move the Hibiki. Akatsuki's now the only one on port defense, as the Inazuma and Ikatsuchi are doing supply line escort._

"Yeah, yeah." I pat her head and get a good-natured pout in response. "Keep up the good work, Miss Genius."

_She's not that much shorter than we are so it just looks stupid._

"Go see Cherche. She's been asking for you." Robin waves us off.

Oh shit.

…

_Cherche is resting in a commandeered inn with Minerva's head poking through the window._

"Uh…hi, Cherche."

_She folds her arms and looks away from us._

It's kind of cute.

"I'll have you know I am fully capable of flying again, Sir Ash." Cherche says to the wall.

"Last time you said that you passed out mid-flight." I point out. "If it weren't for Minerva calling it off I don't know what would've happened."

_She conked out during training five days ago._

We've checked her wounds just to be sure and we didn't find any signs of poisons, so at least that's good…or at least, not a problem.

"Minerva is a worrywart." Cherche pouts.

Minerva makes a noise that I interpret as "what are you gonna do about it?"

I sigh. "Make no mistake, Cherche; I want you in the air. I also don't want you dead, and right now there's a pretty good chance of that happening."

"You have no faith in my resilience." Cherche grumbles. "All I'm suffering from is a mild case of overhealing."

_It's actually a documented thing: Heal too often = bad. Heal too often from critical = real bad._

The heal threshold for each person is variable though. Cherche's had a long military career, so it's starting to catch up to her…but of course that insinuates that Cherche is somehow old and thus it is obviously false. Yep. 100% false. Absolutely.

I sigh. "If your status is mild, I'd hate to see what 'severe' is." Hmm… "Cherche, I'm getting new equipment for the fliers from home in about three days; I'll let you fly if you can prove yourself capable of using them when they come."

"More equipment?" Cherche shake her head. "Perhaps you should be focusing on the basics, Sir Ash."

"Yeah…" She's not wrong. "But basics won't help us win a lopsided war." Change of gears. "Is there something you want to eat?"

Cherche smiles mischievously. "Actually, there is."

_We're pampering her to get our guilt to shut up._

We've made some people very jealous of our treatment of Cherche. Fortunately it's within expectations that we would give preferential treatment to our qualified and sexy Lieutenant though, so it's not a big deal among the rebel troops.

…

[Three Days Later]

…

The new equipment from home has arrived.

Robin has also made a discovery.

_Which she is showing to us right now on the map of Valm._

"See here?" She taps a point on the map. "There is a large city here under Valm control."

The large city is…somewhere to the southeast of the Chapter 17 Fortress. Going by the scale of this map it's reachable by a half-day's walk.

"Obviously," Robin taps the Fortress's point on the map, "it's under Fort Steiger's sphere of influence, so we can't lightly attack it and expect a simple victory. However, Valm is using this city as the primary staging point for all of their Wyverns currently within the region, as this city houses the vast majority of Valm's supplies within the area."

Make sense.

"If we strike and capture the city, we will be able to end Valm's ability to project influence and field the huge number of Wyverns here." She finishes, and then has another thought. "It would also give us the opening we need to strike into Valm's interior and end this war."

Valm has probably more air units than all of Ylisse and Ferox combined at this point, and all of them are circling over our heads (proverbially speaking).

Are we shooting them down during combat? Yeah. Does it seem to be making a dent? Nope.

"However, if we were to strike the city, then the fortress will definitely send reinforcements." Chrom points out. "Are we conducting a separate offense then?"

Robin nods. "Once the enemy reinforcements have left the fortress to engage the primary element assaulting the city, a second strike force will move in and capture the fortress."

If this is successful, we'll have one hell of a stronghold in the middle of Valmese territory. That being said…

"How do you plan to hold these positions, Robin?" Fredrick asks. "We do not have the manpower to make the fortress threatening."

Robin visibly deflates. "That's the problem…and I honestly do not have a good solution."

"What are the bad solutions?" I ask her.

Robin sighs. "We burn the stocks of the city to the ground."

_Given that the planting season hasn't started it would definitely kill most if not all of the city._

"Obviously, that would be bad." She adds. "Ash, as a theoretical question, is it possible for you to…uh, well…"

_All eyes are on us, and how much destruction we can wreak._

Welp. "It would be entirely possible for us to burn the entire city to the ground in a night, nevermind just its stocks." I reply. "Who's in control of the city?"

Say'ri's turn to speak up. "It is squarely within Valm's control…the citizens are primarily Valmese, too. It will not be a simple matter to take and hold the city."

So we can't just decapitate it and expect it to riot, huh?

…

Hang on. "I feel like I should've asked this question before, but how does the Valmese people feel about their Emperor?"

Say'ri looks at me in surprise. "That is…the core Valmese populace believes that Walhart was what their empire sorely needed. Valm's descent into obscurity is a fairly recent development, owing to the lackluster rulership of their previous king."

And thus he's their darling, huh? Not that surprising.

"Valm has never been territorially impressive." Say'ri continues. "But their military record and quality of troops have always been exemplary, which translated to Valm's primary source of income being mercenaries."

So what happened?

"Their last king was one who believed in peace." Say'ri says with a meaningful glance at Emmeryn. "And he believed that the first steps a nation should take towards peace is the reduction of its weapons…you can imagine what happens next."

Yeah. A country that suddenly loses a massive hunk of its income isn't going to remain stable for very long.

So Walhart steps in, revitalizes the army, and goes stomping across the country…when did he decide to do it? Why did he decide to do it?

We know he wanted to gather an army to fight Plegia and stop Grima, but the current Valmese army is far from cohesive. To create the type of cohesion required for a campaign of that size would take years. If he decided to field his current army (before we interfered) against Plegia, what would've happened?

_It would likely shatter against the Plegian desert and feed a lot of blood onto the Table._

…but he should know this. If he didn't, he wouldn't have gained control over the continent at all, even if his control is constantly being undermined by rebels.

_We're to blame for that though._

…

In any case, eventually it was decided that we would attack the city/fortress combo, because sitting around won't do us any good. Say'ri will lead the primary assault on the city, and Chrom will lead the secondary assault on the fortress.

Say'ri will also have the bulk of our troops…including us, as the Phoenix won't be helpful indoors.

With that out of the way, new equipment!

"I think this is first time you've made anything exclusively for our mounts to use." Blackbird One notes.

Which is true: even the hardpoints are designed for humans to use…they're just mounted on the Pegasi and Wyverns.

"Let's hope it works as expected." I install the headset onto Magna's head. "How do you feel, Mag?"

He growls and tilts his head left and right.

"Too heavy?" Magna shakes his head no, it looks like…he's just getting used to the weight.

_After a few minutes of letting him adjust, we're ready to take off._

It's us, Cherche, Kyle, and Cynthia in the air for this exercise.

"Alright, guys…how are the headsets working for your partners?" I ask them.

"It's a little hefty for her." Cynthia replies first. "And it covers her eyes a bit." As expected.

"No problems here." Kyle replies (a tad smugly).

"All clear…of course." Cherche says. She's still angry we grounded her for three days.

_For the record: she was allowed to move as she pleased once her tummy cleared up, we just forbade her from flying._

"Ok…" Let's start this thing.

_Ping._

"System connection engaged." I report, and then pat Magna's neck. "How do you feel, Mag?"

Magna…seems to have lost the ability to fly straight without guidance, a trait shared by the other three as well.

_We take a moment to get our mounts flying straight again._

I expected that. Yep. Totally…it was probably due to the sensory overload. "You ok now, Mag?" Magna growls affirmative. "Ok…let's start the trial. Kyle, take the rear and charge us."

"You sure, boss?" Kyle replies. "I'll actually hit you."

Kyle's probably a little better than we are. "Yeah, I'm sure."

"Boss has a death-wish~" Cynthia sings softly into her mike, so we can all hear it.

_We dutifully place ourselves at a lower altitude so Kyle can do a proper diving charge._

_Kyle, feeling like he's being played with a little, goes 'well ok then' and accepts our invitation._

Do not turn around…do not turn around…let Mag handle it…

…

There! Duck!

_Magna suddenly inverted and dropped, and Kyle's weaponless charge zoomed cleanly over his belly._

"What the—" Kyle mutters into his radio. "Boss, are you cheating?" He does manage to stop before smacking against the ground, so that's good.

"Maybe." I laugh. "Ok, at least I know that part's working. Typhoon, Mirage." I address two of our squadrons we reserved for exercise today. "Come on up, we're dancing today."

"Your new shoes fitting ok then, boss?" Typhoon One replies. "Don't want you to bail on us because your feet hurt."

_She looks a little bit like Katria from Shadow Dragon; same bloodline, maybe?_

I grin. "The new shoes are shiny and they work just fine, Typhoon. Hope you can keep up."

_The four of us reform into a squadron and wait until the eight Pegasus Knights are at level flight with us._

"Alright. My side, pay attention to your mounts. Typhoon's side gets priority on attacking."

_Acknowledgements from both sides._

"Ok…begin."

…

[Ground]

…

Robin, while consulting with their army quartermaster, caught Miriel staring intently at the sky.

"See something interesting?" Robin asks after mimicking Miriel for a little while.

"Yes." Miriel hums. "Their flight patterns are nothing short of peculiar."

Robin looked up again and saw the red streaks left behind by the Phoenix Company's Cruise engines. "Even more unusual than usual?"

"Look closely at their lead element." Miriel notes.

_Sounds like she's been stealing from Ash's dictionary. _Robin squints to find Magna up in the sky, looking for his quirks.

_Kyle's Wyvern – has a tendency to break to his right when defending._

_Minvera – tends to pull up during jousts to let Cherche swing her poleaxe._

_Magna – Flying style that relies heavily on sudden speed changes to let Ash do the cutting._

_Not that surprising. _Robin smiles a little. _Since he did learn from her…aha, there they are._

_Also Cynthia (because why not) – hugely exaggerated attacking runs with impeccable defensive flying, tailored to encourage allies with its over-the-top aggressiveness._

As Robin watched Magna fly, she realized that Miriel was right: there was something off about the way the Wyverns (and Cynthia) were flying.

Namely, it felt as if… "When did Ash learn to read minds?" Robin frowns. "That kind of response time is absurd."

As she watched one of the Pegasus Knights strike at Ash's back, Magna suddenly dodged to his left and the strike missed cleanly.

"It is cheating." Miriel summarizes. "He is cheating somehow."

"Even if you say that…uh oh." Robin remembered that she still had a job to do.

…

[1st Person Camera]

…

Small squadron test is a success! Now all that remains is testing its capabilities with the entire company. Magna showed more than just a little confusion with four nodes, so when we have forty it's going to be real hard to manage.

Mm…we're just going to have to play it by ear and see what happens, I guess.

For now though, we're going to practice harder and simply get more experience. That should help alleviate the issues we're having.

…

…

[Setting Off]

…

We've sent the Blackbirds up to do recon while our combined army moves out.

With all of the rebel forces we've assimilated into our ranks, we have a grand total of about 3000 troops attacking the city.

The contingent assaulting Fort Steiger is about 200 men strong, with the Shepherds acting as the core element. Naturally they're led by Chrom and Robin.

As for the bigger army: Say'ri is the ground commander, I'm the air commander, and I'm borrowing Nah for anti-Risen operations in case they show up.

_Gerome also inserted himself into Cherche's squadron._

I think he knows something we don't, so I'm letting him do as he pleases, with the additional proviso that Cherche doesn't take any aggressive combat roles.

…

Deep breathes.

…

Based on our intelligence, Steiger Fortress itself houses around 4000 men. Once the attack starts, 3000 of them will depart from the fortress to assist the city, which leaves the Shepherds with a 1 to 5 disadvantage, but it's one that Robin is confident she can handle.

In our case, though…

The city has a garrison and militia presence of 15000 men.

Steiger can contribute 3000 men.

Surrounding towns and smaller forts can contribute a sum total of about 30000 men.

So…Yeah. We're up against an army of fifty grand, not counting any villagers who feel like getting their hands dirty.

_The city's population is around 90 thousand, counting their garrison and militia._

Our plan involves attacking the city to lure out Steiger's men (because Steiger will get there first before the surrounding forts) so we can attack Steiger itself. Whether if we actually succeed in taking the town is a nonfactor, since our primary objective is still their supply cache.

"I've sent messengers to all the rebel elements I have contact with." Say'ri informed us during the morning briefing. "They will all converge upon the city and assist us in the operation against Walhart's tyranny."

Assuming if all the rebels respond to our call to arms, we will have an attacking force of 12000 men for the attack.

_The rebels have more than that, but 9000 is the maximum manpower they can send at the city and have it arrive before the Valmese respond._

And Valm will respond: the armies of Cervantes and Yen'fay (100 thousand men apiece) are mobile. Cervantes is doing sweeps within flare up zones south of Valm's core territories (so to the south of the Gate marker on the game map) and Yen'Fay is sitting between Steiger and the Volcano.

_Supposedly their anti-rebel efforts are hampered by a lack of air power._

Once the siege starts we'll have…Miriel thinks we have at most two weeks before Cervantes or Yen'Fay will come after us, so we need to either accomplish our war goals or conquer the city until then.

Our airforce is responsible for handling the Valmese air force, which at last estimate was around 1500 Wyverns in total (city plus Steiger).

We have…what, 50 unit's worth of air power?

…

We're going to engage them fair and square and then cheat our asses off, because that's the American way.

…Hoo boy.

.

.

.

{ === + === }

Author Notes:

This chapter has a narrative tumor for some reason.

_We gave our own story cancer._

Very sad. Get well soon™.

EDIT: If you're going to leave a review then please do it while logged in. Quite often good points are brought up but I can't comment on them because they're guest accounts. :(

To the guest review that says there is no tension: You're like 90% right: the injury taken wasn't friendly fire is the only discrepancy.


	34. Valm Campaign - Steiger City Battle

{ === + === }

…

[Day Before The Attack]

[1st Person Camera]

…

The march took us ten days.

I liked the fact that we were able to move unopposed, but it really puts me on edge.

"Tell me about it." Robin had said sometime during the march. "I expected at least some opposition."

"May I ask why?" Said Fredrick.

"Well…it's not as if spying is a recent invention, nevermind how we took over a Valmese city." Was Robin's reply.

…So…yeah. We're a touch on edge even while setting up our final camp.

Speaking of camps.

Our war camp is separated into two sections. The front section is established within a fairly light forest close to the city, and the back section is…well, further back.

The front section houses the standard troops for their attack. The back section acts as an airstrip for the Phoenix squadron. It also houses all our ammunition and support staff.

_And Chrom?_

Their party will break off and head for the fortress before we start our operation.

Per Robin's suggestion, we're letting the troops rest for two days after we establish camp. While this completely obliterates any surprise attacks we could have set up…

"Set up additional campfires." Robin orders. "It's far too optimistic to believe that the city is entirely unaware of our approach, Ash."

Well, yeah, sure, but… "If they had that kind of information, wouldn't they also know of our troop numbers?"

"Troop numbers are a fickle thing, Ash." Robin smiles. "Especially when our ranks have been increasing as we marched…well, Say'ri's ranks, anyways."

Which is true…going by the tally earlier today, the troop count has almost doubled. Mostly land forces, and even then mostly light ground troops like Myrmidons and Mercenaries, but the numbers definitely help…man, I'm making it sound like we just randomly got people. Our troop count doubled because only a third of the rebels Say'ri sent envoys to responded in time, so in that sense we have less manpower than expected.

_Reason why we're bringing up the troop type is because the Valm's garrisoning force is primarily Armored Knights and Fighters, with Archers on the walls._

Given the size of the city they probably have units of every class in there, but they just have shittons of armor. Armor's tough to break down when the vast majority of the army are NPC quality troops.

"You're the boss." I shrug. "I imagine the extra fires will help prop up morale, too."

"You're learning." Robin laughs. "It's about time, too."

…

So. In terms of positioning, our army is northwest of the city, which puts us somewhat between the City and the Fortress. Robin's plan of spoofing our numbers and removing the element of surprise is to lure out the defenders from the Fortress (which is the original target to begin with). In the event that the enemy responds, the main army (us) will engage the troops of Steiger out in the open while the Shepherds strike at the Fortress itself.

We're relying on the garrison being too slow to respond, which feels like a bit of a stupid wish, but eh.

_Robin's relying on the Blackbirds providing tactical information before the garrison could move into a striking position just in case they try to outmaneuver us._

Steiger Fortress itself doesn't have a sizeable force when compared with the bulk of what we have, so we can definitely mop up before the City can respond properly.

In the event that the Fortress doesn't take the bait, we'll just assault from the Western gate like normal and go from there.

I hope they fall for the fakeout, because I'm not looking forward to the city assault.

…

"Yo." Robin pats my shoulder. "How are things?"

_We're standing on a small hill observing the city._

The city's huge and walled, but the problem is the fact that the city is surrounded by a deep slummy ring of poor houses that makes assaulting it from anywhere other than the main gates impossible. Ugh…at least the people in the slums are going to be not-friendly towards Valm, I suppose.

"Doesn't look like they fell for the bluff; the city's going into lockdown." I reply. "Robin, if you made my life harder I swear to god."

She just chuckles. "You're a big boy. You can handle it."

"Sometimes I wonder." I shake my head. "How are things on your end?"

"Good. I think I have far more power than I actually need, though." She says with a sigh. "It's surprisingly hard, integrating Cynthia and the others into the Shepherds."

…Really?

She nods upon seeing my face. "Yeah…they're just too good."

"That's…a very odd problem to have." For the record, I'm diverting all of the future children assets (except Nah and Morgan) to Chrom's force, since there's a greater chance of things screwing with their plan and thus they could use the extra hands.

Robin fiddles with her hair. "Take Severa…or Luna, or whatever her name is. She's so aggressive it's hard to know what she's planning."

…I feel like they didn't have these kinds of control problems before.

"Cynthia loves grandstanding too much and loses track of her surroundings too quickly." Robin continues. "Yarne disappears from time and time and I can't give him orders, Brady will follow orders but only if he's within distance of Maribelle, Gerome sticks to Cherche and I can't peel him off…" She finishes her statement with a loud groan. "Why do they respect you and not me?"

"Erm."

"Don't mind me, I'm just venting." Robin huffs. "They're good kids…very skilled, very sharp, but obviously not used to working in as a medium-sized squad." She ponders on that for a moment. "Actually, it feels like they're most used to either working as individuals or as a single, cohesive unit." She says at last. "Their response times and patterns make me think that there're some other kids we haven't found yet."

I…hm. "Well, you're not wrong." I shrug. "I have to admit I never noticed those quirks myself."

"That's because you never had them fight as a unit, I think." Robin points out. "Some of them tend to work well with each other, but they don't have the flexibility of a Shepherd, oddly enough."

…Huh, you'd think that being brought up in a world where the threat of being mauled to death is ever present would've turned them all into jacks of all trades…or maybe it's because Lucina's the undisputed leader and she's not currently present?

_Or maybe she's just commenting on how they have no support conversations with anyone but other future children and their parents._

"Oh well." Robin sighs again. "They're all good no matter what happens, so I shouldn't be too worried about what's going on. We'll be moving out this afternoon, by the way."

As planned. "Yeah." I raise my hand. "Be good…and stay safe out there."

Robin glances at my hand. "Who do you think I am?" She smirks.

_High five!_

…

[Steiger City, Garrison Commander's Office]

…

The Valmese head of garrison (henceforth referred to as Commander) looked at the papers in front of him. "These are all accurate, correct?"

The aide who delivered the paper nodded. "Up to their time of departure from their city, yes sir."

_So those fires are decoys. _The Commander thought. "And the head of the enemy is…"

"I have conflicting reports, sir." The aide said nervously. "Um…"

"Speak. I am not the last man." The Commander laughs. "I cannot fight if my men tell me falsehood."

"Yes sir." The aide cracks a small smile. "The reports either state Princess Say'ri or the Lord of the Coasts to be the General of the Army."

The Commander's eyebrow went up at that. "Is that certain?"

The aide nods.

_The Lord of the Coasts…_the Commander thought it over. _If it was just Princess Say'ri, then we would be in a favorable position. Her tactics and strategies tended to favor small skirmishes even before the war began…I don't think she had any experience with larger armies to begin with._

He smiles a little. _Her pride is what made Yen'fay join us as a desperate measure, after all. Were it just her… _his smile fades. _Were it just her, we could end her rebellion right here._

"Just to be sure." The Commander says slowly. "We're talking about THE Lord of the Coast, right?"

"The Feroxi, yes sir." The aide nods. "The same one responsible for orchestrating the raids within our sphere of influence."

_It's the real deal. _The Commander could feel a cold chill down his spine. _If the rumors are to be believed, then it's the same man that broke past Ignatius's navy with just four warships…the same one who overwhelmingly struck our ground forces time and time again, the same one who, even when cornered, rescued his entire force from our ambush while dealing a horrific counterattack._

"Um…sir, if I may." The aide said softly. The Commander nods for him to continue. "I…don't know what I should trust, but if…I would like to rejoin my family for the next few days."

The Commander raises an eyebrow.

"If the Lord of the Coast's reputation is true, then…well, I would like to get my family out of this place while we still can." The aide finished with a downcast glance.

The slums around Steiger city was a development that occurred after the war began, as such, most of its residents are war refugees. People who suffered due to the war and the people who are currently causing suffering in the war tend to make for bad neighbors, wall notwithstanding.

_That's right…the city already has its own problems. A siege will only make it worse. _The Commander realized. "I understand…do what you must." _A battle like this will have collateral damage. Perhaps I can evacuate the civilians through the eastern gate? _The Commander sifts through the small stack of paper he has. _However, against the Lord of the Coasts, I need to use everything I have…_

He sits down to plan. _First, I need to nullify his control of the skies…_

…

[Morning of the Operation]

…

Valm, having had warning of a reasonably sizable force moving from all around Steiger City, was more than prepared for the oncoming attack. A little too prepared, as it turned out.

"And here I thought they would have gathered a bigger army." A Sniper captain manning the walls smirked upon seeing the rebel lineup out in the field. "Keep your arrows near and your eyes sharp! We'll have this done before the day's up."

"Knowing how those guys fight? We might be on the back foot here." Her lieutenant warns. "Actually, we _will _be on the back foot here. Spotters, keep your eyes on the sky. Shout if you see even a bird fly strangely." She received a few acknowledgements for that.

"So what's the commander doing?" The captain asks, peering at the slowly advancing ranks of enemy troops.

The lieutenant glances at the gate they were tasked to protect. "He's sending out cavalry. They're going to hit the enemy lines first."

"I expected as much." The captain smirks. "Alright, let's get ready as well. All mages ready!"

…

"Blackbird One to Genbu, enemy mages are moving, expect incoming fire."

Say'ri wasn't exactly used to that callsign. "This is Genbu, I understand." She and her Swordmaster bodyguards stopped short. "It looks like the enemy is preparing to strike with their cavalry elements."

"Blackbird Two here, we see them…Two to all air units, report status."

"This is Suzaku." Rafale One reports. "All units are ready for battle. The sky's clear…it doesn't look like they're going to dance with us right off the bat."

"This is Seiryu." The leader of the rebellion's air element reports (much less confidently). "Not a peep up here. Maybe they got scared?"

"Keep your eyes open, girls." Ash chides her. "Alright. All ground elements move for anti-cavalry tactics. Take it nice and easy and don't be shy about asking for help."

"I understand." Say'ri replies as four ranks of Pikemen arrange themselves before her.

"Condor to Hanabi." Ash says next. "What are the enemy mages doing?"

"Ehm…it feels like they're using wind magic?" Nino guesses. "They're probably going to do an arrow attack soon." She rode with a Blackbird to act as a mage advisor.

Ash glares at the wall. "From that distance? Yikes. Condor to all units, keep your shields nearby."

He gets a chorus of affirmatives in reply.

"Blackbird to Chessmaster." Blackbird One said suddenly.

Morgan looks around for a few seconds before remembering who that was supposed to be. "I'm listening." He replies.

"Enemy cavalry elements moving on our left flank. I count three distinct forces."

_Valm tends to use cavalry in troops of one hundred men. _Morgan reminds himself. "Ok, understood. Uh…Chessmaster to left flank, adopt defensive formations." He then covers his radio. "Take us up higher."

"Aye aye!" His Wyvern Knight (rebel NPC) replies readily and the two soar off into the skies.

Morgan, now having a better vantage point of the battle, could see clearly the three rows of cavaliers and Paladins arranging themselves for a charge against the rebel Pikemen.

"I wish I had my mother's senses." Morgan sighs and then flips his radio on again. "Left flank units Bear and Bobcat, draw back fifty paces."

…

The Valmese cavalry captains watch the signal-less response to their presence on the field.

"They just closed up the gap I wanted to charge into." One of the captains grumbles. "Looks like the commander was right about them. Their chain of command is definitely leagues above ours."

"Sneak attacks are entirely negated, and flanking maneuvers won't be nearly as effective as we hope." Another captain agrees. "Still, look at their actual organization…it's full of holes."

"Even rebels have their own colors, I suppose." The first captain sneers. "Good, let's dive right in."

"Shall we?" The third captain raises his arm.

One of his mages fires a flare into the sky.

…

"They're signaling." Blackbird Two warns. "Looks like their archers are about to fire."

"Left flank, raise shields." Morgan commands. "Archers, prepare to intercept enemy cavalry."

On cue, the enemy cavalry charged towards the two lines of Pikemen on the left side of the field.

"They fired." Blackbird Two notes. "Arrows incoming."

"Shields! Brace!" Morgan roars.

As Valm expected, the archer's barrage (enchanted by a stream of wind going from the walls to the battlefield) reached the rebel Pikemen, forcing the Pikemen to huddle underneath their shields and weather their barrage.

Because of the barrage of arrows, the Valmese cavalry were able to maneuver around the wall of pikes and slam into the Rebel's sides.

That being said, Valm also needed to time their charge carefully with the barrage, and thus the charge did not have its full power.

_That_ being said, "not a full charge" means very little when the people that did the charging are now busy stabbing faces.

"Damn. Left reserve, assist!" Morgan commands. "Archers, what are you doing?!"

"Yeah, yeah." The rebel archer captain growls. "They deserve it."

_God dammit. _Ash shakes his head. "Do your petty rivalries later." He snaps.

"Yes, 'sir'." The rebel captain smirks. "Alright, lads! Full volley! Show those Valmese dogs who's boss around here!"

_I figured we'd have a problem like this. _Ash thought as the Valmese cavalry attack disengaged due to the rebel barrage. _I didn't think they would take their fucking rivalries into a warzone though._

"Yeah, their response time is good but their teamwork is shit." One of the Valm captain sneers as they withdraw out of archer range. "Reorganize, we're going to strike again." His men roar in reply.

"So long as they engage out of the city, Valm's going to have an upper hand in terms of morale." Morgan mutters. "Boss, permission to change tactics."

_Already? _Ash frowns. "Condor to Chessmaster, it's your field."

"Yes sir." Morgan takes a deep breath. "Genbu! We're moving onto Phase Two. All Phoenix units prepare for CAS."

"What's phase two?" Say'ri asks nobody in particular. "Genbu here, I understand. We're ready."

Currently, the rebel forces are arranged in a slight concave pointed towards the city they're assaulting, with the bulk of the forces on the left and right flanks to deter any maneuvers Valm may make.

Valm, on the other hand, is still streaming cavalry out of the city.

"Reserve units, move to the center. We'll advance and plug that city gate before their cavalry can establish field dominance." Morgan orders. "Archers, prepare volleys, and don't screw it up this time!"

"Che, the battle's just begun and he wants to charge? What a moron." The rebel archer captain scoffs. "Well, fine then…it's better than being run down by enemy cavalry."

"Suzaku to all units, you're cleared to fire on ground targets. Limit their movement." Rafale One orders.

"Easier said than done, lead." Rafale Two grumbles. "Those bastards are hiding."

And they were. The cavalry units that retreated fell back to the slums surrounding the walls to use the cover of both the poorly constructed buildings and the city's archers to their advantage.

"Let's just bomb it." Gripen One says flatly. "It'll solve a lot of our problems later on."

Rafale One agrees, but "Until the boss gives us the order, we're only providing CAS." She replies. "Hold on to your bombs."

…

The momentary lull in battle allowed Say'ri and the bulk of the rebel forces to organize somewhat into an attack force, and they prepared to advance towards the walls under the cover of the Phoenix girls' fire.

…

Upon receiving the report from a messenger, the Valm Commander looks up from his map.

"They've just taken some light losses and their tactician already wants to move to close range?" He scowls. "Are they that confident, or desperate?"

"Probably the latter." His strategist replies. "We assumed that the enemy was much larger than they actually were and thus prepared for a siege battle. Once our cavalry can take to the field instead of hiding behind the walls, we will certainly win at that point. Their tactician likely knows this."

The commander toys with some of the pieces on the map of the city. "Doesn't seem like their tactician thought things all the way through, then." He sighs. "Have the rest of our cavalry use the southern and northern gates, advance slowly and under concealment; the enemy is most likely using their eyes in the sky."

"Should we intercept them, sir?" The strategist asks.

The Commander thinks it over for a bit. "No, just tell our men to be careful…tell me, did they switch tacticians today?"

The Strategist was caught off guard by the question. "Maybe? It's hard to tell as our enemies avoid conventional signals."

"But _he_'s still in attendance, I presume?" The Commander presses.

"I assume so." The tactician nods slowly. "We say Wyvern Knights equipped with those…things."

"Hm." The Commander waves the Strategist away. _So the lord of the coast is NOT in command? _He thought. _What's going on? Based on the spies I sent, he's supposed to be the one in control of the entire army. Or could Princess Say'ri be…_

He then mentally backpedaled. _No, that's not right. They are both capable of commanding, but it's not as if they're the only capable commanders on the field. If there are multiple tacticians on their side, then the plan of combating their responsiveness through increasing the points of engagement will definitely fail._

A small voice in his head told him that he was giving Ash too much credit, but the Commander pushes the voice away: this was a war, and his enemy had a penchant for unusual strategy.

_We are up against an army that cannot be flanked, surprised, or overwhelmed, except through drastically superior numbers...I should operate under the assumption that they have a counter for every plan I make. _The Commander decides. _Dear Naga, what a pain in the back. _He shakes his head and calls for a messenger.

…

Said messenger quickly delivered said message to the message's intended targets.

"He wants us to do what?" The Sniper Captain repeated in surprise. "Is he serious?"

"I'm just doing my job here." The messenger shrugs.

"I feel like he's being too careful with this, but fine." The Sniper Captain motions to one of his mages, and the mage fires a flare into the air. "Let's do this his way."

…

"Chessmaster, the enemies are doing something strange." Blackbird Two reports. "I don't see their cavalry anywhere."

"It's not hard to figure out where they went." Morgan mutters. "They're hiding in the buildings. Left and right flanks, watch the slum roads and set up barricades if necessary. What's the city doing?"

"Hard to say. There's a lot of occlusion along their walls." Blackbird One replies. "Our scouting won't be effective with this much overhead cover. Sheesh…"

The walls were piled high with boxes and cloth, anything to obscure the archers from being sighted from above.

"Ah…the trappings of fame." Blackbird Two sighs dreamily.

"Fame later, spotting now." Ash sighs. "I'm assuming that they're running cavalry through the slum's streets. Watch your corners."

"This is Genbu." Say'ri reports. "We're ready to begin the assault on the enemy's main gate…A-er, Condor, what are you planning? We didn't bring any ladders."

"Don't worry, Genbu, we got this one covered." Ash assures her. "Just keep your head down and let us handle the fireworks."

"Genbu, roger." Say'ri replies, but she's still unsure about the situation as she carefully observes the road between her, her men, and the imposing city gate. At least the rickety structures flanking the main road provided her men a measure of cover against the arrows being aimed at them.

"Tomcats, you're up." Ash says. "Blackbirds, has the city sent out interceptors?"

"Not a thing, boss." Blackbird Two replies. "Guess they're too busy pissing themselves to come at us."

Ash shakes his head. "Still nothing, huh? Dammit. Alright, keep your eyes open."

"My eyes can't be any _more_ open." Blackbird Two laughs.

…

In short order, two of the Tomcat girls flew from the camp (set up within a clearing in the forest near the city) with an obnoxiously large gun between the legs of their Pegasi.

"Tomcat One, Tomcat Two, we're approaching the target." Tomcat One announces. "All ground units keep your head down, this thing's really heavy."

And it was; the two of them stripped all armor and barding and supplementary equipment just to carry it. Not the Cruise Engines, though; the engines were fine.

"Aiming this thing is really hard." Tomcat Two notes with a soft pat on her Pegasus's neck. "How many shots do we get?"

"One each." Ash replies. "Remember, the instant it starts overheating, detach it."

"Aye aye." Tomcat One replies. "I'll take the first shot then."

"Roger that. Condor to Genbu, once we have impact, you'll be cleared to attack. Don't space out."

_Don't space out, he says. _Say'ri huffs in her mind. "I understand, Condor. We'll be ready when the moment comes."

Some of the rebel soldiers, hearing the odd humming over their heads, instinctively looked up.

"Holy shit." More than one soldier muttered.

…

"Uh…captain?" One of the Valmese archers says shakily. "We have a serious problem coming at us…"

The Valm Sniper Captain followed the soldier's pointed finger to see…

What looks like a long tube being slung underneath a Pegasus.

_What the fuck is that? _The captain couldn't help but think. _Pegasus performance enhancers? Wait no that's bad no matter what it is! _"Mages! Start casting! Archers! I don't care if you miss, shoot it down, now!"

…

"Whoa, they're opening up on you guys." Blackbird One notes. "Tomcats, you ok?"

"Yeah, we're breaking off from our attack." Tomcat One grumbles. "This thing is heavy. My arms are getting tired."

"Condor here, what's the rate of charging on Gatecrasher?" Ash asks, doing a flyby over the city walls to see if the archers would shoot at him instead (they don't).

"I think I'm at halfway." Tomcat One replies.

"Same here." Says Tomcat Two.

_Che, to think that the spool up time would be so drastically different during combat conditions… _Ash sighs. "Alright, slight change of plans. All units hold position until Gatecrasher is ready to deploy."

"Roger that. All ground units maintain position!" Morgan orders.

…

[Exposition Time!]

…

The Gatecrasher is an experimental weapon designed for the sole purpose of bursting through gates. As far as mechanics go, it is a large railgun slung underneath a Pegasus with a clip-size of eight wooden stakes. Each stake uses an explosive steel head.

It looks like a coil of eight steel bars attached to a box.

Due to design flaws (namely, the inability to turn it off quickly once it's turned on) the weapon empties its entire clip at the target when it is fully charged.

_It needs charging?_

Gatecrasher uses an experimental charging system developed by reverse-engineering Nah's Fanelia Cannon and the rapid-loading element of the Thunderbolt Anti-Ship Cannon. The result is a cannon with the gate-breaking punching power packed into a reasonably manageable size.

_So why not make it ground artillery instead?_

We tried. The problem with it being on the ground was that it was oddly difficult to design it in a fashion that takes advantage of it being a ground mount. To wit:

The advantage of making ground-based artillery is that the ground can brace and absorb shock far better than a moving platform like a Pegasus (thus allowing for a stronger cannon). Problem: The stronger cannon uses more spirit dust, and thus 'kicks' when it fires…which will utterly break the rails on the cannon and will render the cannon useless after a few shots.

Even better: ground artillery is supposed to be heavy, and we can't move around heavier artillery because the carpentry engineering isn't there yet. We've tried it, and the wooden base just can't handle the stress of moving the gun around. Moving it piece by piece doesn't work either, since, again, the heavier gun breaks on use.

Lastly, ground cannons are just harder for us (a small invasion army) to use. If we lose our position we would need to leave it behind.

So…yeah. Having it hauled and fired by air is objectively better for us at this point.

_Actual answer: The weapon had a turnaround rate of three weeks, and though Morgan's design was excellent we just didn't have the time to do anything else._

Since the cannon can't be too close to the belly of the Pegasus due to the possibly of extreme overheating, it's held aloft underneath the Pegasus through ample wiring. Unfortunately this means that the massive cannon sways during flight and utterly ruins the Pegasi's flying ability.

_Also it looks like a giant wire penis without the companion spheres._

…I mean…sure.

Anyways, the fact that the gun can't be fixed down means that the Tomcats, who are the smoothest fliers and are the best in terms of managing inertia, are tasked with managing and firing this weapon.

[Exposition Over]

…

Let's see…fast forward thirty minutes.

In those thirty minutes:

Valmese Cavalry have moved into position among the slums, and are patiently waiting for their signal to attack. None of them felt the pressing desire to charge out into the open on their own after seeing some of their allies who did get gunned down in short order.

Valm's infantry are still waiting behind the walls, spread out among the city streets but primarily concentrated near the gates just in case if the gates were breached.

Valm's archers were still busy firing volley after volley towards the rebel's front lines.

On the other hand…

The Rebel cavalry were waiting to engage any Valmese cavalry that might appear.

The Rebel infantry were attacked by the archers sporadically and switched formations to use the slums for cover.

The Rebel air force were still observing the situation, occasionally firing at the Valmese archers to ensure that said archers would keep their heads down and avoid firing back.

"Tomcat, are you ready yet?" Ash asks, irritated. _What's with the Valmese army? Why aren't they running us down?_

"Sorry boss! I think we're ready at any time now." Tomcat One unfortunately thought that Ash was angry with her.

"I don't appreciate the fire we're currently under, Ash." Say'ri grumbles. "Don't let us die out here."

"Gatecrasher, proceed to firing point." Ash orders. "All allied air assets, cover their approach."

"Genbu, move to the gate and keep your heads low, be ready to attack at any time." Morgan adds. "Left and right flank units, stay focused and advance in tandem. Beware of enemy cavalry units."

"Blackbird One here. I don't see any enemy cavalry units at all, watch yourselves out there."

"Shit, still?" Ash growls. "And here I thought they'd come after us by now."

"They're too scared now." Rafale One laughs. "Alright, Rafales on me, we're going in."

…

"Still no new orders?" A Valmese Paladin asks his lieutenant. "They're attacking the gate now."

"Our orders are still to wait until their troops have entered the city entirely." The lieutenant sighs. "I have to admit I don't like how cautious he's being."

"Judging by the weapons they keep bringing out-" The Paladin winced despite himself when he heard the archers on the walls cry out. "I certain understand the commander's thoughts. Pass word to the men: be ready to attack, but keep their heads low and don't get curious."

"Yes sir."

…

After a few volleys of fire from the Seiryu and Phoenix squadrons, the Valmese archers opted to hide under the cover they piled onto the walls rather than continue their engagement.

"Pah…well, I guess I can't blame them." Ash shrugs. "We got our window, Chessmaster."

"Genbu, standby for assault." Morgan says. "What about the Gatecrasher?"

"We're in place." Tomcat One says triumphantly. "Discharging in five…four…"

…

The Valmese archers' orders were to hold the walls for as long as necessary and to vacate the walls as soon as the enemies brought out a new weapon for use…obviously they were to delay the breach for as long as they could, but they were advised to avoid throwing away their lives.

Given that there was a Pegasus with a massive gun underneath it currently aiming for the gate, the Valmese Sniper Captain figured that their job was done. "Ok, pass the word down the line, we're abandoning the walls."

"That thing doesn't look too dangerous." One of the messengers noted concerning the Gatecrasher. "I mean…whatever it is they're shooting at us with is worse."

"One shot one kill, yeah." One of the archers muttered. "The little shits just don't fight fair."

"Incoming!" One of the other archers yelled shortly before another wave of Phoenix (and Seiryu) fire struck the walls. The one who did the yelling did not survive.

"Those bastards." The Valm Captain growls…before realizing that the weird weapons mounted on two of the Pegasus Knights were glowing. "Off the walls, on the double!"

…

"Gatecrasher, firing!" Tomcat One declares.

The weapon itself fired its payload of eight stakes in a manner not unlike vomiting.

_Ew._

The salvo of shots impacted themselves into the wooden gate for a brief moment before the shock of the impact detonated the warheads and sent the shrapnel within said warhead tearing through the gate.

However, the gate held.

"Tomcat Two, firing!"

The second barrage of fire struck the gate and blew it to pieces, showering the enemy soldiers inside the walls with bits of metal and wood.

"Breach! Breach!" Morgan yells into his radio. "Ground units! Advance! Air units, commence CAS! Clear the gate area!"

"Son of a bitch!" A Valmese Warrior Captain on the ground exclaims after he overcame the shock of having the gate he was supposed to watch explode off of its hinges. "Form ranks! Do not let their troops through!"

He unfortunately did not have much a choice in the matter, as one of the enemy Pegasus knights dove over his men and dropped a Force bomb right into their ranks.

_In order to preserve morale when working with ground units unaccustomed to seeing the results of incendiaries and shrapnel warheads, a new type of bomb was invented._

As the name implies, the Force Bomb is pretty much a lightless flashbang (so it's just a bang). It makes a loud noise along with a hefty blast of wind, but is otherwise nonlethal. It does stagger and confuse the target, which makes said targets easy pickings for anybody else currently on the battlefield.

Thus, when the Rebel ground forces stormed through the gate, they saw the Plegian guards crawling around on the streets desperately shaking off the aftereffects of the force bombs.

Without waiting for orders, the Rebel soldiers attacked and slaughtered the Valmese guardsmen.

"It really is one trick after another." The Valm Sniper Captain growls. "Messenger: tell the squad leaders to use the side streets and to keep their heads covered. We'll show them what a city battle is really like. Rest of you, follow me."

…

"We've captured the gates! All forces move in to the city center, we'll take their head before the day is done!" Say'ri declares triumphantly.

She then hears a voice in her ear. "Blackbird Two to Genbu, the city's occlusion is too high." The voice says. "We will not be able to provide support unless you stay on the main streets."

"Genbu, I understand." Say'ri replies. "We'll adjust accordingly."

The main streets of the city are wide and surrounded by reasonably tall buildings, and due to wartime preparations it was littered with makeshift barricades designed to stop an attack from the ground, with preciously little cover against any attacks from the air or from the buildings themselves.

While this meant that Say'ri's advance would be supported from the air, it also meant that anyone marching on the main street would be undefended against any attacks aimed at their heads.

And naturally, that's what Valm capitalized on.

…

Say'ri led her force of Myrimdons and Swordmasters (as well as some blokes with Axes. They're not even fighters, just guys who have axes) down the main road towards the first enemy defensive barricade.

"Archers, ready!" She hears the Valm side captain bellow out.

"Shields!" She orders, and her Myrimdons raise their tower shields in a defensive line and advance forward.

The first barrage of enemy arrows impacts the shields to no real effect.

"Thank you, Ash." Say'ri mutters. "Advance!"

She was then suddenly made aware of a barrage of arrows whistling onto her head when one of her bodyguards was critically struck and killed.

"Shit! Longbows!" Say'ri yelled out. "Keep your heads down!"

While she had wanted for them to put the tower shields over their heads, it would create the secondary problem of providing no defenses against the archers in front of them.

"Phoenix! We need support!" Say'ri yells into her radio as her forces suffered from another barrage of arrows. "Get rid of that barricade in front of us!" It was ultimately easier than trying to find and kill archers hidden among the densely packed town buildings.

She heard a reply: "Typhoons, roger, commencing Close Air Support."

…

The Valmese forces heard the roar of whatever the enemy Pegasi had underneath their wings as a quad of said Pegasus Knights flew overhead. By chance, the captain of this particular blockade point was a veteran of the Phoenix Squadron's raiding attacks in the month prior, and came to the conclusion that staying and maintaining the position was a Really Bad Idea.

Thus, he and his men pulled away from the defensive barricade of carts, boxes, and barrels almost as soon as he saw the enemy air units go over his head.

Shortly after his retreat, the barricades suffered a series of explosions and scattered all along the street.

"Move, move!" Say'ri eggs her men on as they suffer yet another barrage of longbow fire.

They didn't get a chance to do so, as a yell from one of the buildings caught their attention. Though she didn't understand the yell, the reaction from the nearby buildings told her exactly what it was.

Civilians armed with spears appeared from within buildings and the side streets, all with the intention of protecting their city from the invaders.

"Seriously?" Say'ri growls. "Cut them down!" She snaps.

Though the villagers were ballsy, they were still the equivalent of a level 1 Donnel with less health and even less babysitting, and the first wave of them were cut down almost instantaneously. The rest of the villagers, by the virtue of being villagers, quickly lost their nerve and fell back.

"Just as expected…pah." Say'ri growls. "Watch for attackers from the side streets, we move!"

…

[1st Person Camera]

…

Whoo…this is really something.

_Very descriptive. Truly, the work of a genius._

Let's see.

Given that we're flying cover and aerial recon over the city, the city itself looks like a massive square wheel, where the spokes of said wheel are the main streets. The city itself is also build up high into the sky…for its time. Most of the buildings are four stories or so. There doesn't seem to be a rich people neighborhood, though.

_Our city is better._

The main streets are pretty wide, tall buildings aside, so we can do air support over the roads just fine. The problem comes from the millions of narrow side streets in the city. As expected, the city's militia and idiot villagers know the side streets pretty well, so they're constantly harassing Say'ri as she approaches the middle of the city.

Granted, the ground forces are proving themselves superior during their attack (and as far as I can see the Valm's defenses are just crumpling like paper) but at the same time the constant harassment is definitely causing damage. Hmm…

"Condor to Bulldog."

"This is Bulldog." Captain Stephan replies. "What can we do for you, general?"

Again with the rank inflations… "You guys have a new job: go protect the ground commander." I can move these guys around as I please since they're under my direct command. "She's pushing towards the city's center at the moment."

_Stephan's forces are currently manning the gate._

"Yes sir." Stephan replies, and moves out towards the front of the column.

…

So…why isn't Valm doing something more substantial?

I mean…

We made a shitton of fires, so Valm definitely noticed, yet they did nothing until we started the operation.

We arranged ourselves into attack formations at around 0900 this morning, they noticed and sent cavalry.

Their cavalry bopped us in the head a few times but that was it.

At 1000 I pulled out the Gatecrashers, and we breached at 1030.

It's…what, 1100 right now? Say'ri's making slow and steady progress and she's halfway through the city.

I don't know how fast Ye Olde Invasion Wars are supposed to be fought, but I feel like even with the Bullshit Tactics I field it should take far more than just two hours to gain our war goals in this fight. I mean, sure, we're not going to capture the entire city in just two hours, but…they outnumber us badly. There should be something far bigger than this waiting for us.

Morgan knows this, which is why he's leaving almost half of our attack force holding the area near the western gate.

_Why are we leaving Morgan in charge of the ground war again?_

It took us ten days (roughly) to march from the city we held to Steiger. In those ten days I ran a few trials that can loosely be classified as 'how quickly can Ash lose control of a large battlefield?' The response is "Pretty Fucking Fast Actually".

Despite all my hopes otherwise, I'm not much of a strategist. I'm not bad, but when we're dealing with a theatre that requires serious battlefield coordination across a wide scope I tend to lose track of unit positions very quickly. Add in the fact that there's still that Griffon squadron on Valm's side…point being, I can't command when I'm busy trying to stop my face from being punched in, and Morgan's just objectively better at it than I am.

_For the record: the soldiers are encouraged to take active and reactive decisions based on their current situation on the ground, but at the end of the day they're still highly reliant on there being a traditional chain of command to operate properly._

Anyways…I'm expecting Valm to do something soon. I just wish I knew what it was.

…

[3rd Person Camera]

…

Ultimately, Valm waited until Say'ri pushed all the way to the heart of city before making their collective counterattack.

Upon reaching the city center, Say'ri saw small bands of Valmese Warriors emerge from the town hall and charge towards them.

_Too little to warrant an air strike. _Say'ri thought. "Swordmasters, with me. We will engage the incoming enemy."

The two groups of soldiers – no more than forty men on each side – charge at each other and engage in melee combat.

…

Suddenly, there was a great roar all around the Allied Force troops. Windows all around them burst open and show mages with their spells on their fingertips, drawing the eyes of the allied forces upwards.

That made room for the Assassins and Armored Knights to move in through the side streets. The Armored Knights appeared as if out of thin air and closed the path of retreat behind the allied forces. The assassins, per their class name, dove straight into the ranks of the allied force soldiers and began killing anyone they could see.

Upon seeing their path of retreat suddenly closed by ranks upon ranks of Armored Knights, the less disciplined units in the rebels began to panic, and the Valmese assassin units selectively targeted these men (especially the leaders) to help further drive the unit into disarray.

Say'ri, who had just engaged into battle with the Valmese Warriors, was in no position to turn and assist. Instead, she settled for the second best option.

"Genbu, requesting CAS." She says into her radio to the confusion of the Warrior trying to take her head off. "Our rear is compromised by enemy forces."

"Blackbird copies, sending support now."

Valm, despite the ferocity of their counterattack, nevertheless shook at the Pegasus Knights suddenly over their heads.

"Shields, men! Shields!" The Armor Knight Captain calls out to rally his men, and the line of knights crouch as one and raise their shields. The massive shields used by the Armor Knights overlap and form a solid wall of steel, and the force bombs bounce off (somewhat) uselessly against them before exploding.

_They still do disorient their targets with the explosions, but the lower stance adopted by the Knights stopped them from being blown around._

"Enemy element is still alive. Repeat: enemy element is still alive." Blackbird Two warns into her radar. "Commence second sweep."

"Easier said than done here." Gripen One grumbles. "It's too narrow for us to bomb and they're too well armored for our guns."

"They're opening up on us, too." Gripen Two notes as the sky starts to fill with balls of Wind. The Valmese mage corps saturated in the city was starting their interception fire against the Phoenix.

Suddenly, Blackbird One took all of their attention. "Mayday, Mayday! I'm under attack!"

…

[1st Person Camera]

…

How?! "All AA ascend and support! Blackbird One, dive!"

_Our squadrons of almost twenty Wyverns zoom high into the sky._

Fucking hell, the cloud cover got real bad since this morning.

_Blackbird One dives and is being followed by a squadron of Wyvern Lords._

"How did they sneak up on you?!" I demand.

"Two wasn't doing her job!" Blackbird One snaps. "Ah, god this hurts!"

"I'm doing my best over here!" Two retaliates. "The ground units are all over the place!"

That's probably what happened…the two of them are supposed to work as a unit, and right now we're working on a field larger than our coverage distance, so there are a lot of blind spots a smart enemy can sneak through.

"Oh hell." Blackbird Two breathes. "Warning! Multiple enemy air units from all sides!"

Fuck.

_We frantically look around even as we're riding to Blackbird One's rescue._

The enemy air units from Steiger Fortress finally showed up.

No, that's wrong.

The enemy air units from Steiger Fortress finally decided to attack. They practically have the entire airspace surrounded…how long would a maneuver like this take?

_Longer than a few hours, that's for sure._

We attacked into a well-fortified trap. Shit. "Phoenix Company, we will now engage in total air superiority combat!" I yell into the radio. "Stay with your squadrons and watch your spacing!"

_The Wyvern Lords chasing after Blackbird One toss a few javelins her way, but it's pretty obvious they're not trying to kill her._

They just wanted to pull us out of position…credit to them for that. "Alright." I take a deep breath. "Condor Flight, you guys with me?"

"Two." "Three." "Four."

"Ok…all accounted for." I mutter. "Establishing datalink."

_Ping._

…

[3rd Person Camera]

…

The Wyvern Lord squadron was actually tasked to intercept and tie down the enemy lead element (Ash) while the griffon Squadron closed in for the actual fighting. They were originally supposed to fly high with the sun behind them or to take cloud cover when necessary and sneak up on said lead unit, but they stumbled into Blackbird One who flew lower than normal due to the clouds obstructing her vision.

Thus, figuring that it would be better for them to bait a trap that their target will respond _to_, the squadron attacked Blackbird One. As they expected, the ones first to respond was none other than the enemy's lead element.

The Valm Wyvern Leader could not help but laugh. "It's payback time, you-"

The end of his sentence was cut from him as a Poleaxe flashed precariously close to his neck. Fortunately, his neck itself was spared due to his reflexes.

"Ok, no taunting. Focus on fighting." The Wyvern Lord growled as he turned to engage Ash. "Message clearly received, you little bastard." He charges at Ash's exposed back.

…and is eminently surprised when his swing was met with nothing but air. Fortunately his training overrode his surprise and he ducked underneath his enemy's counterswing.

"What the…" the Lord twists to check his target. "Come back here!"

Ash had immediately disengaged following the exchange and was targeting some other Valmese attacker.

The Lord turns with the intention to give chase, but he is immediately stopped by another rebel Wyvern aiming for his underbelly.

"For a small group you're sure persistent." He growls and turns to chase after his new target.

…

"Good, continue to provide cover for Blackbird." Ash comments. "Keep your aim straight and your asses covered, we can do this!" To hammer his point home, he cleaves a Valmese Wyvern Lord who wasn't paying attention in half during a fly by.

"Boss, the rest of the enemy forces is hitting our ground troops." Condor Two warns. "We need to go help them."

All over the city Valmese Armored Knights were converging upon the western path to the center of the town, squeezing in the rebel line and systematically cutting them down.

"We don't have the luxury. Focus on what's in front of you first." Ash snaps.

…

Morgan, upon seeing the sudden influx of enemy forces, whistles under his breath. "Whoa. That's really bad for us." He mutters, tapping his chin. "Alright."

_He returned to the base by the time Gatecrasher was fired._

Morgan jumps down from his perch on a tree and gets the attention of the base's workers. "Pack up, we're moving."

"What?" One of them grunts.

"We've lost track of the enemy cavalry, so some of them are probably coming here." Morgan says. "Let's get out of the way before they do that."

"We're not moving without the boss's orders." One of the men retaliates. "Or Say'ri's." He adds after a pause.

"Then die here." Morgan shrugs. "I'm sure the boss won't mind if you lose all of his ordnance because you were too stubborn to listen to someone he's appointed."

The worker stared at Morgan for a minute. "Alright, lads! We're packing up!" He yells out.

And just in time, too. "Chessmaster, we have cavalry breaking out of the slums. They are headed to your position." Blackbird Two calls out with forced calmness.

"Damn." Morgan takes out a spellbook. "Prioritize the air munitions. Stars, we'll delay the enemy for as long as we can."

_The Stars are Nino's brigade of mages. Currently, they're comprised of just the Destroyer Group Six girls._

"Yes sir!" Raiden Senior salutes sharply.

"I'll assist with the defense as well." Nah says, already suited up in her X-winged jacket armor.

Morgan nods. "Alright then…please slow them down before they reach the edge of the forest."

…

The Valmese cavalry force headed towards the rebel encampment was divided into five separate units, all of them approaching on different angles toward the position of the rebel's camp.

While the rebels they were used to fighting never bothered to set war camps for major engagements, the Valm Commander rightfully inferred that these particular enemies, with their air units flying in and out of the city airspace constantly, would have need of a forward supply base _somewhere_.

While the rebel Pegasus Knights would inexplicably disappear from sight whenever the Valmese knights got distracted, they were able to guess on the rebel base position after watching from the slums for the entire morning.

Thus they knew where to attack.

…

A Cavalier belonging to the closest Valm unit (closest to the forest) noticed a glint of orange against the cloudy sky and signaled the rest of his allies. Said glint was, in fact, racing towards them very quickly.

"Are they counterattacking…?" The unit captain (a Paladin) mutters. "What is that strange light?"

He got something close to an answer when a small red blur streaked over his (and his men's) heads. Despite all of this, they did not slow their progress.

"What was with that armor?" His lieutenant, a sharp-eyed Ranger, wonders. "Boss, that was an enemy."

"Ignore it, we're targeting the camp." The Paladin replies.

_As if they had that choice._

Nah, now behind the enemy's charging line, turned and unhoistered her railgun.

The Paladin was made aware of the attacks at the rear of his column when he heard the screams of the men as they were systematically struck down by…something.

"Dammit. Turnabout! Defend yourselves!" The Paladin captain roars.

"Good." Nah breathes and palms her Dragonstone.

…

The Valmese cavalry on the ground had arranged themselves into a loose column to counter the would-be attacker. Through their training, they were usually able to handle most threats to their livelihood.

Sadly, Armored Dragon Nah did not constitute 'most threats'.

The Valmese men were thus (not unreasonably) surprised when the little girl hovering in the sky charged at them…and then was suddenly replaced by a massive spinning dragon tail.

"MANAKETE!" The Captain managed to bellow before Nah slammed her tail into his side, knocking him and five others off of their mounts.

The rest of the cavaliers scattered and brought out their javelins, showering Nah with waves upon waves of…javelins.

"That mobility is absurd." One of the cavaliers seethe shortly before Nah shot him in the chest.

He's right, by the way: her evasive maneuvers were utterly erratic, and the thrown javelins had little chance of landing a hit.

That being said, the Valmese knights had noticed something: her attacks (whatever they were) were only marginally effective against their armor, and were practically useless against the Great Knights.

"Fan out! Keep her distracted!" A Valmese Cavalier yells. "We'll keep her pinned here!"

As if to spite him, Nah climbed into the sky and flew over to assault a different Valm unit.

"You scared her off." His friend teased. "Rally! Continue our charge onto the enemy camp!"

In the end, though Nah is able to utterly disrupt the columns of Valmese cavaliers, she can't stop them entirely by her lonesome. It also doesn't help that she's avoiding lethal shots and attacks on purpose, only utilizing lethal force when she's counterattacking.

…

Morgan, on the other hand, isn't nearly as nice.

A few Cavaliers, tasting victory on the air, decided to charge forward at maximum speed and ran head-first into Morgan's Arcthunders.

When the other units rode past the charred corpses of the idiot frontliners, they (reasonably) became cautious of the woods.

"There's no foliage around here." One of the Valmese men muttered. "We should be able to see the mage that attacked them…whoa!"

The air around him suddenly filled with Elfire and Elthunder spells and his unit beat a hasty retreat.

"Che, shooting while having this spell up is hard." Raiden Senior groaned. "Little sis, you ok?"

"Yes." Raiden Junior gasps. "Just-just need a moment." Her transparency spell broke almost immediately as she collapsed to her knees.

_I really need to set a formal and easy to remember name for this one: it's the Screen Cover spell._

"We don't really have a moment." Morgan says, dropping his transparency as well. "We need to hit the left flank next. If you can't handle it, go back to the camp and help them pack faster."

"I-I can do it." Raiden Junior stands a little shakily.

Morgan thinks it over for a few seconds. "Get your little sister back to the camp." He says to Raiden Senior. "We can't retreat if you're passed out in the woods."

"Eeeh?! I can still fight, too!" Raiden Senior sulks.

Morgan just sighs. "Go."

Though the brown-haired Raiden sisters were not happy about being pulled out of combat after one salvo, they really didn't have much of a choice.

_I made a gamble by putting all of our best fighters in the operation. _Morgan thought as he moved to the next interception point with the other two Stars girls in tow. _I didn't think it would come back to bite me in the rear this badly._

…

While all of this is going on, Valmese soldiers were encircling and engaging the rebel forces within the city at all angles.

Without support, the rebel troops quickly broke. Those who could run did, those who couldn't were boxed in by the Valmese Armored Knights and then shot full of arrows.

"There's more to war than just good equipment." The Valmese commander commented when he received word of the Rebel's losses. "I'll teach you that right here, Lord of the Coasts."

However, what the city did not count on was the fact that the rebels were able to keep the western gate open, and with the gate open enterprising thugs from the slums decided that it was now a good time to pay a visit to the city properly.

These thugs naturally made the city guard's job harder as they fanned out into the city to basically just be assholes. There aren't enough of them to attack and take the other gates, after all.

…

With the inclusion of the city's less Valm-inclined elements, the already hectic battlefield became a clusterfuck of incredible proportions.

Due to the resulting breakdown of Valm coordination, Say'ri and her small group of Swordmasters were able to coordinate with the Bulldog unit to strike at various Valm elements on the ground and help regain a measure of the control for the Rebel units.

But they're still nowhere near close enough to actually winning the fight.

_The two of them had just managed to surprise and eliminate a wall of Armored Knights barricading a wide side street._

"Genbu to Blackbirds, can you hear me?" Say'ri says to her radio. "Still nothing, huh?"

"The Boss did say that magic will interfere with our radios." Captain Stephan noted. "Given what's going on over our heads…"

He looked up to see spells being thrown at a frankly stupid pace into the sky. "Looks like our girls are putting up a good fight." He says approvingly.

"Good fight or no, our men on the ground are being slaughtered." Say'ri says as she checks her gear. "While I expected our attempts to capture the city to fail, I didn't expect Valm to be this prepared."

"Beg pardon, your highness, but you WERE attacking one of Valm's core cities." Stephan laughed. "If this were the Feroxi capital, all of you would've been dead before you reached the walls."

"And if we had Ash's help?" Say'ri cracks a small smile.

Stephan had to actually think for that one. "Well…ok, then it might be a bit more even."

They were then distracted by the sound of footsteps coming from a side path nearby.

Stephan raises his fist, and his soldiers regroup into four ranks of ten and prepare their crossbows. "Princess?"

"I'd prefer if you did not address me as such." Say'ri draws her Killing Edge. "I'll leave the front to you, Captain."

"Aye aye." Stephan only has eyes for the incoming group of Valmese Mercenaries as Say'ri barges her way into a nearby house.

…

[Aerial Theater]

…

When the bulk of the Valmese air force struck, the entirety of the Phoenix and Seiryu squadrons split off over the entire city to engage.

This was seen as an odd move by Valm, and thus they responded by doing the (fundamentally) same thing: saturating their forces over the city airspace to engage all enemy targets.

However, Valm very quickly realized that their enemies had broken off into their formations of four on purpose and quickly adapted their strategies to match…which was just "let's all get together and just kill these fuckers."

Although the Seiryu squadron was equipped with the airman rifle, their inexperience ultimately proved too much for them and soon after the battle started the squadron routed. Around half of the squadron was killed, the rest escaped.

The Phoenix squadron, on the other hand…

The Valm forces found themselves on the receiving end of unusual strategies this fight: their enemies (the Phoenix) were divided into nine squadrons of four, and each squadron was fighting as if they were one woman.

The Phoenix could not be flanked, could not be surprised, and…surprisingly could not do a whole lot of damage.

"It must've been because of all of their defensive maneuvers." A Valmese knight recounted later. "They flew like mad protecting each other, so they couldn't attack all that often."

But even though the Phoenix had fewer chances to attack, they still had the sacred art of Gun, and thus every chance they received to be aggressive resulted in a Valmese air unit disengaging with serious injuries or crash-landing in the city.

With their defensive flying, the Phoenix squadron was able to mitigate what would've otherwise been a lethal situation for themselves into a lethal situation for everybody besides themselves.

In other words: while the Pegasus girls were busy dogfighting, the bulk of the Valmese air force was busy cleaning house in the city.

…

…

[1st Person Camera]

…

…

This is rough. The datalink system makes it easier, but hell, this is rough.

I think this is the fifth Wyvern Lord I'm fighting against. Or maybe it's the third guy for the third time, I can't tell anymore.

_The day's starting to end._

The sheer amount of magical damage Valm is hurling from the ground at us has made our radios entirely useless. Given that the ground and air elements are doing their own things, I'm not too worried about this, but as soon as we get breathing room the fact that we've lost a measure of our previous coordination will be glaringly evident.

Here's to hoping nobody's paying attention once we go back to normal coordination, because the last thing I need is for some sharp-eyed commander to figure out that we're weak to magic spam.

_What's the current condition?_

Seiryu's entirely gone. Half of my Wyverns have taken damage but we're making do with the Vulnerary needles (inject healing right into our bloodstream).

The Rafales are down. They're currently hiding out in the slums somewhere and they still have their guns, so that's good…Raf One took a javelin through the lung. The vulneraries are keeping her alive, fortunately, but…

Gripen Squadron broke from the combat zone to protect Blackbird Two. I haven't seen them for a while.

Typhoon and Tomcat squadrons went to cover the retreat of some of the Seiryu girls. I've lost sight of them too.

Otherwise…

We've done a pretty good job with keeping the squadrons together in their isolated units, but we are definitely running on fumes here.

_What is the datalink, anyway?_

The Datalink is the helmet gear mounted onto our mounts. They interconnect with each other and feed visual information from the mounts to each other so, say, if Magna has someone on his tail, then (though she's not here) Minerva with the link would be able to warn him just by looking at the chaser.

Obviously, this has some serious drawbacks: namely, the amount of connection nodes can't be too great or our mounts will get flooded with information and their reaction speed drastically reduces. To combat the information overload, using the datalink means that the squadrons need to be far away from each other to reduce bad information.

The biggest drawback then is the fact that the information is being processed by our mounts, and they prioritize personal safety over combat advantages, which means that the mount and the rider need to have a good rapport for the datalink to be effective.

For example: Magna will slightly raise his head if he's pulling up, twist to his right if he wants to bank right, tense his back if he wants to bank left, and slightly arch his back if he wants to dive.

I need to pay attention to Magna's little physical quirks and adapt my attack patterns accordingly, or else he'll completely disorient me and then I'm utterly useless for the next five seconds.

It's got a lot of rough edges.

_Game skill equivalent: Datalink – Decrease damage taken and damage dealt by 10% for each unit that possesses this skill in a 3 tile radius, max effect 40%._

…

Anyways.

This furball is a huge mess, but we're still kicking (for how long, I don't know).

Morgan shot up a flare a while back to tell us that the airstrip has been compromised. I didn't see a second flare for compromised equipment, so I hope that means he and the support staff got out ok.

I've lost contact with Say'ri, but she's with Stephan and he knows how to use his unit down to a T.

The majority of the rebel forces in the town are scattered to hell and back, regrouping them for this battle will be impossible.

I don't know what's going on in Steiger Fortress. Judging by the fact that there hasn't been any major shifts in enemy movement, the Fortress either fell impressively fast or hasn't been attacked at all. I hope it's the former.

Valm has locked down all the gates out of the city, and they have a shitton of archers on the walls.

…

I mean, I knew that this attack was going to be less than effective in the first place, but their reactions have been nothing short of impeccable.

I hate to say it, but it feels like I have an information leak I need to handle.

For now, though…

_I tap my pocket spellbook for the megaphone spell._

"All units, listen up!" My voice resonates through the air. "Commence assault on our target objective and pull out immediately afterwards!"

_If you remember, our target objective was the town's supply stores._

Sucks to fail a bonus, but if we keep this up my girls are actually going to start dying. Best finish this while we still have some steam left.

"All AA on me!" I yell normally. "We'll provide cover for the rest of our air units!"

_All of our Wyvern Knights disengage from combat as one and reform into our flock._

While remembering to disengage the Datalink, that's very important.

The enemy air elements are momentarily confused by the fact that we just suddenly refused to fight, but they're going to start giving chase at any mome…there they go. Awesome.

That's still a lot of air power on our asses as the Pegasus Knights reorganize into a cohesive squadron.

Good thing the radios still work at super short ranges. "We're going to do a flyby of the enemy's supply centers and bomb it. Who has incendiaries left?"

"We do, boss." That's…um. Fulcrum. They're one of the 'decent at everything' squadrons.

Deep breaths. "Alright, all units, we're going to sweep the area before Fulcrum can make their run. Go in at full power and drop everything you have."

"Boss, your left!" Condor Four alerts me.

_We look to our left and catch a blur of brown._

Fuck me. "Two with me, rest of you continue the assault!" I don't need you on my ass right now, Griffon knight! Though I'm glad you showed up alone.

_The two of us turn to engage the incoming sole Griffon._

…

[3rd Person Camera]

[Valm Command Room, Town Hall]

…

It was now the edge of dusk, the Valm Commander stood facing the window looking outward at the bright colors of the spells being fired over the city and the multitude of units deployed in an effort to safeguard the skies of the city.

He heard a dull thud behind him. "The information you brought was well-used, Sage Excellus. I thank you." The Commander says without turning.

Excellus smirks. "That poor, poor fool of a man." He says. "I must thank Yen'fay for giving us the opportunity to kill his own beloved sister."

_So that's how it is. _The Commander thought. "Are you here to take command, sir?"

"Oh heavens, no!" Excellus…laughs/shrieks/does something. "I have no desire to get involved in such dirty work. Just so you know, Yen'fay's army will arrive within three days…try to wrap this up before then?"

_Excellus does the noblewoman's laugh. Y'know, 'OH-HOHOHOHOHOH' all high-pitched and stuff._

"I suppose the raids in the south have been removed then?" The Commander inquires. "I heard that they had issues with a very small band of rebel raiders."

"The folly of relying on a non-Valmese." Excellus sighs theatrically. "I will never understand why our lord uses such filth."

_It's because they're better soldiers than you, you moron. _The Commander thought idly. "Where are you headed to next, Sir?"

Excellus examines his nails. "Ah…I want to pay a visit to the Fortress. They should be done mopping up the attackers by now. I want this town cleaned up before I get back. Ta-ta!" He vanishes in a beam of light.

"What a repulsive man." The commander growls. "Still, his information network is not to be taken lightly."

"Eh…I don't know about that." A girl's voice said.

The Valm Commander drew his sword with a flourish. "Who's there?!" He demands.

"Oops…uh…chirp, chirp. Chirpy." The voice said hurriedly.

_As in, saying the word 'chirp' instead of mimicking a bird._

The Command lunged at the source of the sound.

Something small darted below his lunge.

"Guards!" The Commander roars as he turns around. "I'm under attack!"

He then felt something slam into his torso, and saw, to his immense disbelief, a petite girl with pure white hair.

"I'm really sorry about this." Kite apologizes as she pushes a second small knife into the commander's body. "But I kinda need you to stop participating in this battle. Oh! Uh… don't worry, the knives are laced with a drug, so you won't die…probably." She seemed really spaced out. "Dad wasn't too sure on the mixture, so…I'm really really sorry!"

The Commander could only hear half of what she said due to the drugs working. He lunges wildly at her with an arm but Kite dances back with practiced speed.

He then saw Kite try to open the window. "Eh?" She fails and exclaims in surprise. "This window doesn't open?"

_Is she really an assassin? _The Commander can't help but think as he slumped against the wall…just as his guards kick down the door with their weapons drawn.

"Assassin!" The guard yells and the Commander resists the urge to facepalm…not that he could, anyways. "Capture her!"

"Shit." Kite breathes with the childishness in her voice utterly gone. "Plan B, then." She snaps her fingers towards the guards.

The guards are suddenly blown to the ground with a massive blast of wind targeted at their shins and the back of their heads. Those still conscious then could only watch as she snaps her fingers at the window and blow all of the glass panels away.

"Count yourselves lucky I'm only here to help my father." Kite says to the guards, and then a grin spreads over her face. "Later!" She hops through the now pane-less window.

…

[Ground]

…

With their attack largely thwarted, Say'ri gathered the remainder of her men and moved to escape through the northern gate per their plans.

Unfortunately their plans relied on air support keeping the gate clear in the event of it being guarded (which it most definitely would be).

"What do we now?" one of the Myrimdons ask Say'ri. "Without the Ylissean forces, we can't break through those Knights."

"Maybe we should be like the other guys and go out in a blaze of glory." His friend said with a hint of bitterness. "The shitheads."

The rebel forces that broke and fled knew they could not escape from the city, so instead they took up the act of widespread burning and pillaging within the limits of the city. While Say'ri hated the widespread chaos, she had to admit that they helped relieve some of the pressure on her forces…especially as Say'ri's own core forces (from Chon'sin) were largely unhurt.

_She had to give credit to the Bulldogs for that one._

"Shitheads or no, they are responsible for luring much of the defenders away from the walls." Say'ri sighs. "My, I'm losing my etiquette."

"We can hunker down until the Boss remembers to break down that gate for us, or we can use a flare to let him know about it." Captain Stephan notes. "It's your call, princess."

Say'ri simply stared at the gate for a while. "Do they look like they're simply standing guard to you?"

Stephan followed Say'ri's gaze. "No, I suppose they're not." He says after watching the guards scramble along the walls against something outside. "I wond-whoa."

A barrage of Thorons tore through the guards on the walls and Stephan saw the shapes of some new soldiers appear on the walls. "That's not a unit I think I'd see around here." Stephan remarks.

"Those…those are Sorcerers." Say'ri breathes. "What are they doing so deep in Valmese territory?"

_Ardent followers of Naga = not a whole lot of dabbling with 'dark' magic._

"The only nation that extensively uses Sorcerers in their ranks would be Plegia." Stephan remarks as the Sorcerers hold the walls with their flashy dark magic. "Come to think of it, there was a Plegian force when we first landed…are these the same guys?"

His question was answered…kinda…when the Plegian troops seized control of the gate and forced it open. "Robin?" He peers at the figure strolling through the gate.

Say'ri was peering as well. "Robin was a man?"

"Hey! Ash!" Hawk yells at the top of his lungs. "Let's blow this thing and go home already!"

…

[The Air]

…

"My god, he has some good lungs." Ash shakes his head. "Two, you still with me?"

"Yeah, boss." Condor Two pants. "Shit, he's good."

Ash tosses away the bisected remains of his poleaxe, replacing it with a lance. "Yeah. We're almost through this, just a little more."

Elsewhere, the rest of the still functional Phoenix Squadron begin their attack run, intent on capitalizing their brief moment of not being killed.

"They'll probably start shooting as us when we get close." One of the Phoenix girls pointed out.

And 'they' did. As the Allied air forces closed in on the city's supplies, the airspace was suddenly filled with spells and arrows.

"Thought so." The girl grimaces. "Everyone, give it everything you've got! Don't worry about hitting a mark!"

The Valmese mages and archers on the ground were thus subsequently surprised as the enemy Pegasus Knights accelerated in the face of the interception fire.

"The hell are they trying to do?" One of the mages scowled after the Allied forces made their run. "How do they expect to hit a thing flying that fast?"

"They're flying faster than our arrows." His archer buddy remarked. "That's pretty impressive, I have to say."

They were then quickly dissuaded from their ponderings by the world exploding around them.

…

"I'm amazed we still had all those Force bombs left." Ash grins. "Guess something went right today. Fulcrums, go!"

"Roger!" Fulcrum One replies. "Fan out!"

_Unfortunately Ash was stopped from seeing the results of the attack via the Griffon Knight jumping down his throat again…metaphorically speaking._

Using the momentary pause in enemy interception, the four Fulcrum girls spread out to cover the entire supply area and dropped their ordnance on the softest looking targets, the granaries.

"Bombs away!" Fulcrum One declared triumphantly. "Bombs Away!"

"Yeah!" Fulcrum Two cheers! "We got 'em good!" She cheers as the majority of the foodstores for the town is on fire.

Gusts of wind tore into the granaries and scattered their embers to the surrounding buildings, greatly increasing the range of the blaze.

"It's about time." Ash huffs as the Griffon Knight makes his retreat. "That fucker had our number. You ok, Mag?"

Magna's growl sounds slightly pained.

_Looks like his wings have hit their limit. _Ash shakes his head. _When did he get hit? I never even noticed. _"Alright, that's that." He sighs. "All units regroup, we'll punch through their lines to the north gate and cover our forces' escape."

…

…

The rebels were able to make their escape aided by the timely appearance of the Plegian detachment and by the shock created through the Valm losing their commander for the engagement.

…And by the fact that the town, due to its inherent density, is starting to burn to the ground.

…

…

[1st Person Camera, Night]

…

…

So.

Let's see.

At the end of the day, the rebel forces lost about 70% of the committed land forces…in the sense that we have around 1500 men of the total 6000ish that we started with.

_Our core of Feroxi infantry remained mostly intact, as they were either tasked to Say'ri or base defense._

First off, this was an operational success. We managed to destroy the enemy supplies and deal a major blow to their air power. While we were unable to establish control over the city, given how the civilians willingly joined the fight against Say'ri it's fair to say that that particular objective was never realistic to begin with.

_The aggressors from the town slums weren't a substantial enough force to turn the tide despite the sheer amount of property damage they were able to incur._

However, this was a failure in the long run: since we were unable to remove the forces stationed in the city fast enough, the Shepherds are now effectively separated from the rest of our units. Icing on the cake: due to the damage we took, it's entirely likely that we won't be able to deal enough damage through raiding to make Valm care about us.

_The city's cavalry had swung north to make a moving barricade between us and the fortress, so going that way is a definite no-no._

Next…our casualties. I don't know who I should be thanking for the fact that we had no fatalities.

Blackbird One has been severely wounded. We're keeping her stabilized, but she needs to be out of the warzone to recover properly.

Blackbird Two and the Gripen squadron fought tooth and nail until they were rescued by a small detachment of Hawk's sorcerers (led by Henry!). They're reasonably ok (mostly just broken bones), and the Gripens will need new mounts. They get props for remembering to detonate the cruise engines when their Pegasi died, though.

The Rafales would've been captured had it not been for Nah's interference. Raf One in particular is also in need of an airlift.

All the rest of the squadron suffered some level of damage, but they can at least fly, so that's good for us.

Stephan didn't lose a man either, but half of his unit is out of the fight.

Seiryu squadron broke and fled, though I don't blame them.

Morgan reports a total loss of everything he wasn't able to safeguard, so everything except for the Phoenix-company specific equipment has been lost.

_A little bit of an overstatement, but it's fundamentally correct._

Ergo we're falling back to the captured port city to lick our wounds.

…

So, the damage we dealt.

By our best estimates, we've killed roughly 20% of the enemy garrison through straight combat, and another 10% tops through air strikes…and Hawk's assistance.

Of the enemy air force, we've downed around half of them throughout the day. Given that most of the air to air combat was slow and fairly low-altitude I'll be surprised if we killed even a quarter of that number.

…

I may have been a touch too optimistic to believe that I could win an offensive war with just technology, especially when I opted to handicap the implementation said technology for the sake of appearing fair.

…

What else…

Nino was separated from the rest of her mage squad when they joined in on an offensive to relieve some of the trapped rebel elements. I don't know where she is, and Morgan by then was too busy safeguarding the camp to find out.

_Her mage squad itself was encircled and destroyed. Stars was an exception as they were on base defense._

The camp's staff took some light losses. Morgan's quick reaction saved it from being wiped entirely…he also may or may not have also gained his own little circle of girls, judging by how closely the Destroyer Group Six girls are latching onto him.

Nah ended up having to fight, too, despite us holding her in reserve for anti-Risen ops.

…well, I'm thankful for her aggression. She was apparently instrumental in slowing if not stopping a huge chunk of the enemy cavalry detachment.

…

_SMACK_ _and we're on the ground._

"Yo." Hawk says cheerfully. "You're not sulking, are ya?"

Yes I am. "I'm not…but what are you doing here?" upsy-daisy...he's got a pretty strong arm.

"Well, I came to see how you're doing." Hawk grins. "The fight didn't go too well, did it?"

I chuckle and shake my head. "That's putting it very mildly. It sucks being on the losing side of an information war."

"So you found a spy?" Hawk asks seriously.

I…I'm still thrown off by his sudden mood swings. "No, but I don't have any other justification for how badly we did." I feel like we would've at least been able to strike at the enemy's headquarters.

"I think it's called 'you had a ninth of the men you needed', buddy." Hawk grins again. "It takes three times the defender's manpower to take down a wall, y'know?"

"Yeah, yeah…" I sigh. "Why did you help us?" How did you find us, even?

His grin doesn't move. "Because I could? You're overthinking it, man. For the record, I don't think any of your men were spies." He adds in a low tone.

Really now. "Why do you say that?"

"Well…Excellus the bastard is very good and finding opportunities created by others. He's not quite as good when it comes to his own efforts." Hawk shakes his head. "He's the perfect parasite, if you will."

…who's Excellus again? The incompetent Anti-Robin?

_Yeah._

Parasite, huh…well, parasite or no he handed our asses to us in a doggy bag. Gotta respect that at the very least…though I wonder what he's parasiting off of?

"What do you plan to do now?" Hawk asks. "I have the manpower to do a night strike if you need it."

…why is he being helpful again?

"We're a raiding force, not a fixing one." I reply. "I need to get my injured home."

"Shame. If you made a night attack you'll win for sure." Hawk…I think he's joking. It's hard to tell.

"Boss, we're ready to move out." Morgan says…while trying to detangle Raiden Senior from his arm. It's quite cute, actually.

"Wish I was that successful at that age." Hawk mutters. "I'll be seeing to my men; later, Ash."

"Alright." I pet Raiden Senior's oddly fluffy chestnut hair. "Let's go. Take care that the wagons aren't noticed."

_Morgan gets to go first. We think he's embarrassed about…what would this situation be? He just accidentally found a girlfriend?_

He accidentally found four girlfriends, by the sound of it.

…

[Next Day]

…

"Boss." Nah comes up to me before we broke camp in the morning. "I have a question."

I nod for her to continue.

"That is, it's less of a question and more of a comment." She backpedals. "Er, it's two comments, actually…"

She takes a deep breath. "Point one: Tiki followed us."

…

She what?

"Well, uh…" Nah turned…and yeah, that's definitely Tiki. Hi Tiki. Stop hiding behind that tiny tree. You're a bigger girl than that.

I'm confused. "Ok, one: Why? Two: how did you get all the way out here without us noticing?"

"I did not follow the army at the time of departure." Tiki says. "I arrived here this aftern-wait, that's not important."

_I imagine she would have a much greater degree of control of her manakete powers than Nowi or Nah, so travelling at high speeds would be easy for her._

The risk of going berserk notwithstanding…

"The important matter is: the town is under siege."

…it's just one thing after another, isn't it? Shit. "Who's doing the sieging?"

"Valm." Tiki replies…I think she wanted to add 'who did you think it was?' at the end. "The army of General Cervantes is sitting at your doorstep, so to speak."

Double shit. I wondered where he was.

That being said, I don't think my town will fall that quickly, and even if it does my…Ylisse's, assets are not at risk. Ninya's too smart for that.

"Ok, that sucks. What's the other message?" I ask Nah. Tiki is mildly offended by our dismissiveness.

"Well, uh…" Nah twiddles her thumbs. "I sensed Manaketes...they're approaching Steiger City."

"And a dark force is approaching Chrom's party." Tiki adds.

_How does she know this?_

…it's just one thing after another, isn't it…"Let me guess…"

Nah nods shyly. "They're Risen."

…

I…I cannot communicate the URGE I have to just let those Risen Manaketes sack the city. I know it's just because I'm bitter from losing a siege, but…

"UUUUGH." I bury my hands in my face. Wait, no, other way around. "Son of a fuck. Ok. Yo, Raiden Junior!" She was passing by.

"Eep!" The little girl jumps at my roaring. "Y-y-y-y-y-yes?!"

"Get me Morgan, Stephan, and Say'ri."

_She bows and scampers off._

"Boss?" Nah asks hesitantly.

Hm.

I wonder what that dark force is…Robin? But I feel like Tiki should know Robin well enough for her to avoid showing up as a false positive, though.

…then again, maybe the fact that this Robin is more Grima-aligned has something to do with it…

…Eh. No point guessworking. I just need to be careful when the time comes.

…

_The crew is gathered, plus Hawk and Kite._

Then let's not waste time. "Nah has informed me that Risen Manaketes are on their way to Steiger City."

"Good." Stephan and Say'ri said as one, earning them dirty looks from Tiki and Nah.

"Well…yeah." I nod, earning me dirty looks from them as well. "That being said, having Risen Manaketes wandering around would be bad for us. It would be bad for Chrom's party, too."

"Ah…that's what this is about." Hawk mutters. I don't know if he actually gets it or not, to be honest.

"So…we're going to intercept those Manaketes?" Nah asks hopefully.

"Preferably before they can reach the town, yes." I nod. "Also, there is the matter of our landing point currently at risk from a Valm counterattack."

"I'll head back to the town with the men." Stephan says assuredly. "I don't think we'll be much good against a Manakete, especially after seeing what little Nah can do."

Nah bows a little.

"In that case," Hawk speaks up…going by the glares shot at him, nobody really trusts him. "Kite will take my forces and reinforce your town."

"Really?" Say'ri asks. "I had thought that Plegia did not have good relations with its neighbors."

"Plegia doesn't. I do." Hawk grins.

_Interesting choice of words._

To be honest I don't trust him either, especially since he bailed on us way back when we picked up Morgan, but at the moment I don't have the time to be picky.

"You plan to join the attack force, right?" Hawk grins at me. "I'm in."

"Yeah. We're going to take down the Risen Manaketes and swing around to assist Chrom." I nod. "Robin has a radio, so we'll be able to establish contact by following their movements."

"I see…so that's why you called us." Say'ri…well, I guess saying 'she finally gets it' is wrong. Hawk's just sharp. "I'll follow the attack group."

Nah nods.

"I cannot stand by." Tiki says. I guess she's coming with us.

Morgan, interestingly, was tormented for a while. "I'll go with you as well." He said finally. "I don't know if you know about this, but for the past month I've been playing with Quartermaster Ninya a lot."

Cue a gasp from the bushes.

_Sounded like Raiden Senior getting her dreams crushed or something._

Morgan just rolls his eyes. "I believe that she can handle the defense of the city impeccably, and so I should not be worried."

But you are worried, and that's adorable.

"Kite will be there too, and she's a better tactician than you are, Morgan." Hawk laughs. "So calm your, er. Y'know."

'Calm your tits' doesn't make a lot of sense in this situation, yeah.

_Kite tosses her short silvery hair in a very Severa-esque motion, and Morgan just looks annoyed._

"You'll be walking?" Hawk suddenly asks me out of the blue.

"Huh? Uh…yeah; Magna's wings are punctured, so I'm letting him go back to heal as well." If his wings don't heal correctly it will affect his flying later.

Say'ri frowns. "I must admit I've never seen you engage in hand to hand combat apart from practice; will you be alright?"

"I have a bag of tricks or two." I wink. "Won't be a problem."

.

.

.

{ === + === }

Author Notes:

Too many theatres…I need to make a map next time.


	35. Valm Campaign - Steiger Fort Battle

{ === + === }

…

_High five!_

…

"You look like you're in a good mood." Chrom comments on Robin's smile.

"I'm anticipating a good fight." Robin says happily. "Is everyone ready to move?"

"We're ready on your orders." Fredrick salutes.

Robin nods. "Good. Let's move before night sets, then."

…

[Night before the City battle]

…

Robin and the Shepherds stumble upon some Pegasus Knights.

"Are they Valmese?" Chrom whispers.

"Their armor's quality is too high to be rebel units." Noire points out. "And the presence of the Griffon riders within their ranks excludes them from the Boss's lineup."

Robin squints to see through the campfires. "I see three of them…must be the same group featured in Ash's report."

"Ash said it was an all-men squad…I'm pretty sure those are girls." Cynthia notes. "Maybe Valm has more of these guys. They probably do, come to think of it…"

"What's the plan, Robin?" Chrom asks?

"We hit them." Robin says simply. "We need every advantage we can get; here's the plan."

…

The Valmese knights were actually forbidden from making a fire to prevent being sighted, but given that it's Cold As Balls™ the order was ignored.

"I can't believe the City's asking for help." One of the Pegasus Knights grumbled. "The Fortress is undermanned as it is."

"The better question would be 'why did her highness send us out here.'" Valm Pegasus Knight B also grumbled. "It's cold. We can make the trip to the city during the day. Why did she send us out during the night?"

"She has a thing for the City's garrison commander, right?" Valm Pegasus Knight C suggests with a wry grin. "Maybe she doesn't want her lover getting hurt."

That elicited a few giggles.

"Hey guys!" One of the Griffon Knights whispered conspiratorially. "Look at what I've got!" She produces a bottle.

"Ooh!" Valm Pegasus Knight A drools a little. "That's some pretty rare stuff. Where'd you get it?"

"I snuck it out of the captain's tent." Griffon Knight A grins. "She never drinks anyway."

"It's a Feroxi wine, yeah?" Peg Knight B notes. "Getting stuff from overseas is pretty much impossible. I wonder how she got it?"

"Her hubby probably got it for her." Peg Knight C huffs. "Perks of being a Countess, I guess."

"Wish I could marry into money." Peg Knight D sulks. "I have noble blood and I'm good looking."

Peg Knight A snorted.

Whatever response Peg Knight D had was cut short by a flurry of arrows aimed at them from beyond the campfire light.

Peg Knight A shot up to her feet with a lance in her hand, but lances are unfortunately useless against well-aimed arrows, and she died with a critical hit to her head.

The rest of the roughly forty units in the camp were woken up by the sounds of bodies hitting the ground (and by the occasional screaming).

"Do not panic!" The Griffon captain roars. "Extinguish fires and take to the air!"

_Good. _Robin thought. _Do that. _To egg the enemy on, she pelted the remainder of the knights with Arcwinds, hitting and killing quite a few of them.

…

Of the 50 units our heroes attacked, 36 of them managed to escape into night sky.

"It's enough for our purposes." Robin notes while confiscating the wine. "As long as the rest of them are afraid of an attack, it will wear on their morale and combat effectiveness for tomorrow. We're done here, let's move."

"Oh…" Anna raps the bottle with her knuckles. "I remember carrying that. It's good. Let's have some later."

Robin, however, just has sparkles in her eyes. "Is it valuable?"

"Maaaybe." Anna's just a touch cautious. "Why do you ask?" She _really _didn't want her to pawn it off: though Chrom himself wasn't picky about what kind of supplies they received so long as it was good, Ash was the one bankrolling this entire war (kinda) and he was a teetotaler. Anna needed her fix, as it were.

_It sucks being on a short leash._

"Well, I figured I could give this to Ash." Robin said thoughtfully "I feel bad about having him pay for all of our gear."

"Give it to me. I can, uh, 'sell' it for better." Anna offers.

…

[Next day, outside of the Fortress]

…

Anna has a headache.

Anna has a headache because she tried to steal the wine Robin stole (kinda), and Robin set a booby trap for her that involved a small mallet.

"Alright, here we are." Robin spies on the fortress through a snapshot tome. "It doesn't look like their garrison is very sizable. It might not even be a full thousand troops."

"You sound disappointed." Fredrick notes with a small amount of worry.

"That is…there are some troops that are not accounted for." Robin explains. "It bothers me."

_You still sound disappointed. _Chrom thinks. "What's the plan?"

Robin consults a map made by Say'ri. It was very crude. "We'll divide into three sub-units and attack through these entrances." She indicates on the map. "This fortress is fairly open in design, probably to facilitate faster troop deployment, so we won't have as much cover…or as many usable chokepoints."

"These are staircases, correct?" Chrom points to some of the tiles on the map. Robin nods. "Should we be worried about possible hidden reinforcements?"

"Those stairs lead to the fortress's dungeons. According to Say'ri, some of the rebel captains and commanders are held in this fortress." Robin says. "I would like to be able to free them as well in this operation." She made a split second decision to withhold the fact that rebel elements, despite the blanket name of 'rebels'…

Chrom knew what Robin was thinking though. "Assuming they all play along with each other." He sighs. "The walls look pretty high."

"They are…thus, the entire operation will be divided into four teams." Robin says. "The gate team will handle the breaching of the gate and will clear a path between us and the fortress itself. The left flank team will focus on attacking through to the dungeons. The right flank will draw the most attention from the enemies, and the middle team will strike at the enemy's core."

…

[Steiger Fortress, 1300 hours]

…

Robin chose this moment to attack because it was right after lunch.

"Yarne, don't mess up your timing." Severa scowls. "Last thing I want is to mess up here."

"Yeah, I feel ya." Yarne adjusts his gauntlets. "Would suck to have our parents die because of something we did."

"Heeeey." Cynthia bops Severa on the head with her lance. "No sad talk. We're going to go and be badasses and everything will be _fine_." She emphasized her last word as if daring fate to challenge her. "Now hop on."

Severa rubs her head angrily. "Hearing you say it somehow makes it sound even worse. Ugh." That being said, Severa had no issues riding with Cynthia.

Cynthia's response is just laughter. "Ok…we're good here." She says after she's done. "Let's go!"

…

The Valmese guards watching the walls were treated to a surprise as a squadron of four air units shot over the walls.

"Attack! We're under attack!" One of the guards managed to bellow out before Cherche shot him in the face with her airman rifle.

The Valmese Wall captain came out to see what was going on. Cherche shot him too.

"Clearing a path." Gerome declares coldly as he zooms across the wall with his scythe, reaping the archers before they had a chance to shoot.

"Lookout below!" Cynthia yells (into Severa's ear, no less) as she, Sumia, and Cordelia bombard the wall guards with javelins.

"I'm getting off." Severa announces when she sees a hole in the Valmese soldiers on the wall. "Don't wait up for me!"

"Go forth and prosper, Sev!" Cynthia laughs as Severa lands and cuts her way through the enemies between her and the area right above the gate.

"Reloading." Cherche states. "Oh, but no one is here to hear it." She says sadly while reloading her airman rifle.

"Shoot her! Shoot her down!" A Valmese sniper yells as he and a few of his archers aim their bows upwards towards Cherche. She shot them first.

"You will not have our gate!" A Valm General roars while lunging at Severa with his lance.

"Oh please." Severa dodges the lance and rushes past the General. "I'm not here for you."

Which was true. Severa was selectively targeting the archers and snipers that were a little too antsy for the rest of the fliers to accurately hit.

The Valm General's response was to fling his lance at Severa.

"Che." Severa sidesteps the lance and it sails off of the wall. "Fine then." She grumbles while the General brings out his axe.

Severa's four Levin Bits detach from underneath her skirt and fly to her hands.

"A Mercenary talented with both magic and sword, I see." The General says approvingly. "Why don't you switch sides? I can offer you a much-"

Whatever offer he was going to make was rudely silenced by Severa's Levin Bits shocking the everloving fuck out of his armored body.

"You can't possibly outbid Him for me." Severa smirks. "Plus, I'm not leaving my mother, not after…" She then became eminently aware of Cynthia listening in. "HEY!"

Cynthia flew away cackling, leaving a red-faced Severa to mop up the remainder of the archers on the walls.

…

"They work impressively fast." Robin remarks. "The wall's almost clear now."

"Shock and awe." Yarne grins. "Drive enough fear and we'll have all the time we need." He then takes a deep breath. "Sev! How's the courtyard!?"

"Contested!" Severa yells back. "Work for it, Yarne!"

"Bah, I thought as much." Yarne grumbles. "Cavalry, it's up to you once I make my entrance."

"Of course." Fredrick hefts his lance.

"Alrighty." Yarne take a deep breath and sets his breaching stakes onto his gauntlet. "Breaking in!"

…

The Valmese guards getting ready to retake the walls from one red-haired girl and four fliers were suddenly greeted by their main gate shattering.

The Valmese guards surprised by the gate shattering were then surprised to see a large red-eyed demonic rabbit tear the rest of the wall to pieces.

The Valmese guards surprised by the demonic door-hating rabbit were then deeply surprised (and more than just a little bit injured) by the handful of cavalry charging through the broken gate into their ranks.

And of course there was a dragon, because obviously the giant killer rabbit wasn't bad enough.

"Get out of my way!" Nowi roars before she carpets the ground in flames, forcing the Valmese soldiers to flee from the fortress entrances.

"Stahl!" Fredrick calls and indicates a target with his lance.

"Yes sir!" Stahl flanks said target (a Warrior) and the two of them rush and stab the poor guy to death.

"AHAHAHAHA!" Noire…does her thing…while sniping down Snipers from her position on the ground.

…

In almost no time at all, the Valmese troops were pushed back from the main entrances.

_The reason why their surprise attack was so successful is quite simply because the Shepherds are steamrolling so hard the Valmese troops can't recover fast enough. Every time they regain a measure of control a Shepherd (say, Severa) would find and effortlessly kill a field captain, throwing the rest of the soldiers back into chaos._

This rapid breakdown of command allowed the Shepherds to break into the fortress proper while the ones responsible for holding the fortress's courtyard shifted their attacks to break every last commanding unit on the grounds.

"If you're in position, go!" Robin yells.

"I understand." Panne says and turns into her demonic killer rabbit form.

One of the Valmese captains came out of the fortress, took one look at the two demon rabbits and one dragon (and the crazy Sniper lady spinning on the grounds killing literally everybody) and went "I don't get paid enough for this" before attempting to retreat from the fortress.

Unfortunately for him he ran into Robin, who unceremoniously shot him and what was left of him into a wall with her Thoron.

"Yarne, let us be off." Panne gestures to the left entrance.

"Yeah, let's do this!" The two demon bunnies rampage down the hallway, to the immense terror of every Valmese involved.

…

…

General Pheros of Steiger Fortress was having a hell of a day.

While she knew that her fort was undermanned, the idea that any attacking force would be able to break through to the primary structure is under five minutes…it was impossible, plain and simple. No amount of manpower would be enough to do that.

And then she heard about how giant killer rabbits and dragons were running around, and that made her doubt the cleanliness of her fort's water supply.

Either way, the entire fortress is in an uproar and she had her hands full keeping track of which messages made sense and which ones didn't.

…

Pheros heard a *thud* behind her. "What do you want, Excellus?" She demands. "Now's not the time!"

"Weeell…I was wondering if you needed a little help, Pheros." Excellus grins. "It sounds like the Fort's having a tough time…his Excellency won't be pleased."

"His Excellency could have spared some more men." Pheros grumbles. "What's the situation in the city?"

"It's much smoother than what's going on in here, I can assure you that." Excellus replies. "For his reputation, the enemy is far better off raiding than fighting like men."

"As if you can judge." Feros mutters under her breath. "If you have the time to loiter around my office, then go and help slow the enemy down with your 'superior' magical skills."

"Oh, heavens no." Excellus smirks. "I should not intrude upon your command, Lady Pheros…I have something better planned."

…

…

"Hey, uh…Panne." Yarne says.

The two untransformed by the time they reached the staircase, because their giant killer rabbit paws are not good at navigating stairs.

"Yes?" Panne sniffs the air.

"Do you really think the rebel leaders will cooperate with us?" Yarne asks. "I mean, we're…y'know."

"Considering what I've seen, I do not believe they will." Panne replies coldly. "However, it is not our goal to mingle with the rebels." She notices some soldiers. "Prepare."

…

"It isn't?" Yarne sounds surprised while he counterpunches a soldier into the wall.

_The previous battle lasted for probably an enemy turn._

"Per Robin's orders, we are to simply distribute weapons and continue onwards." Panne replies.

Yarne became worried. "What weapons? I didn't bring any. Should I have brought some?"

"It's alright." Panne smiles slightly. "We are not the only ones in this operation."

"Really? It doesn't feel like it." Anna grumbles, burdened as she is with bundles of swords. "Help me carry some of this, will you? Gaius isn't pulling his weight."

"I have to pick locks, Honeypot." Gaius says blithely. "I need to keep my arms free."

"And we are providing you a clear path." Panne says serenely. "So have no fear and move onward."

Anna pouts. "Don't say something that sounds philosophical when you're just avoiding work, dammit!"

…

…

[Right Flank]

…

The Feroxi soldiers had a really tough time here. They kept constantly crashing into something invisible.

Kellam sighs as he uses his large axe to separate a Valmese's upper body from its lower half. "I wish they'd notice me even while I'm killing them."

"Now, now. You shouldn't blame them." Miriel says with a surprising (and worrying) amount of happiness. "Invisibility is a difficult thing to combat."

Miriel's happiness comes from the fruits of her research and a gift from Ash (upon learning of her research), as such, Miriel's new robe –bulkier than the one Sages wear—gave her invisibility so long as she remained in high-light areas.

It was also-underneath its layers-a touch form-fitting, and she tried not to think about why Ash made it that way. She had to admit that it was quite comfy, though.

Either way, the two of them were able to punch deep into the huge room that is the right flank virtually uncontested. Kellam did suffer attacks from the enemy of course, but given that all of them seemed to have trouble targeting him any damage he took merely glanced off of his armor.

"That is impressive." Lon'qu mutters. "The ability to sally into the enemy with no contest is truly impressive."

"Unlike us, who have to fight for every inch, eh?" Gregor laughs. "We make noise so enemies are distracted!" he bellows as he clubs a Valm soldier with his sword. "Let friends do as they please!"

_How perceptive. _Miriel though upon hearing Gregor's voice despite there being a practical screen of enemies between the two groups. _We can only remain undetected due to outside interference._

"With Gregor being as loud as he is, it's no wonder the enemies only have eyes for us." Olivia says as she sweeps the legs of a Myrimdon. "Lon'qu, we should move closer to the left wall."

"Yeah." Lon'qu notices a General approach his wife and decided to Astra the poor idiot to ribbons. "Stay close to me."

…

…

[Middle Flank]

…

"The two flanks are going well. Drive deeper into the fortress!" Robin roars.

Under the withering fire that is Robin and Tharja's Thorons, the Chrom-led part of the Shepherds crashed through the enemy ranks distracted by the noise from below and their right.

"This is one of the most effective plans you've ever made, Robin." Chrom notes with pride. "This is going almost too well."

"The future kids have that much impact." Robin replies. "They're good when they're in their element."

Chrom frowns slightly. "So I see…I hope they're alright. What do we know about the enemy leader?"

Robin cuts down a Valm Mercenary that lunged for her. "She's a shrewd administrator and a capable Valkryie." She huffs. "Also, Ash wants her alive."

"Eh?" Chrom was surprised. Not surprised enough to miss the Sniper aiming at him (he counterfired with a javelin). "Why?"

"He said it would make our work down the line easier." Robin replies. "I don't know what he means, to be honest."

Chrom thinks it over. "Lisse!"

"Yep!" Lissa backs away from the enemy she was attacking with her hammer.

"We're going to attack the garrison commander!" Chrom declares.

_Good choice. _Robin smiles. _Lissa's the best when it comes to a full powered nonlethal attack. _"Tharja! Provide them support!"

"Whatever you say." Tharja giggles.

Robin shudders in response, and the two of them blanket the hallway with Fire and Flux spells as Chrom and Lissa barge past the rest of the Valmese soldiers between them and the throne room.

"Don't let them reach the throne room!" A Valmese Swordmaster yells and moves to block despite the covering fire.

"You dare block my precious Lissa?!" Maribelle snarls and blasts the Swordmaster out of the way with an Arcwind. "Know your place, mongrel!"

Another Swordmaster, not happy with Maribelle's mouth, decided to attack her back.

"Oy." A low growl distracted the guy though, and he turned to see a vicious-looking young man with a scar on his face.

Said vicious-looking young man then beat the shit out of the Swordmaster with his bare fists for having the balls to try and attack Maribelle.

"Thanks for the assist, dear." Maribelle smiles. "I feel many times safer with you around."

"Heh." Brady pounds his fists together. "I got your back, ma."

The two of them then pause when they hear someone that sounded like Vaike go "Clear the way!" somewhere to their right before a lot of screams drowned him out.

…

Pheros barely had the time to prepare her personal combat plan before Lissa broke down the wooden door to her room with her massive hammer.

_Steiger's forte has always been the ability to move troops quickly…in other words, power projection. _She mulls it over shortly before Lissa arrived. _For their strategist to adopt a plan that completely obliterated this advantage…was it Him? No, he's attending to the battle at the city, it can't be Him._

_Damn. I really wish his excellency gave me more men. _Pheros now thought as she fires an Arcwind at Lissa, who just tanks it like a champ. "You dare intrude upon Steiger!?" She roars.

"I'm gonna intrude this hammer into your FACE!" Lissa grins in a very Vaike-like way and

"Lisse!" Chrom yells, just in case Lissa forgot about how she was trying to capture Pheros intact.

_Lissa still rams her hammer into Pharo's heavy wooden work table and snaps it in half._

Chrom, while not necessarily confident in leaving her sister to face a general alone, decided that it would be in both of their best interests to guard the open door to stop them from being overwhelmed.

…

[Lissa versus Pheros]

[Round One: Fight!]

…

Pheros shot at Lissa again with Arcwinds, though this time Lissa dodges the fire just fine before moving into hammer range.

In response, Pheros pulls out a sword.

"Valkyries shouldn't use swords!" Lissa declares, offended, as she brings down the hammer.

Pheros dodges the clumsy hammer strike and lunges for Lissa in retaliation.

Lissa abandons her hammer and actually throws a punch, causing Pheros to back off in surprise.

"To think a Princess would take up brawling." Pheros smirks. "Whatever backwater nation you crawled out of must be a hellhole."

Lissa recovers her hammer. "Ash said it was smart to have options, and he's never wrong about these things." She grins. "Now come quietly and I won't have to scoop what's left of you in a bottle."

_She knows she has to keep her alive, right? _Chrom thought with increasing worry (while blocking the one tile entrance to the throne room like seriously why was it designed like that? It's such a good place to grind for supports though)

"Big words." Pheros sneers. "Show me what you've got, brat."

Lissa's grin turns Ash-like in its feral-ness. "Hammer! Go!" The back of Lissa's hammer started spouting fire. The front of the hammer grew spikes.

_The spikes were adornments on the hammer's sides. They just flipped over 180 degrees to point in the other direction._

"I'm comin' for ya!" Lissa declares with a savagery that's honestly very unbecoming of a princess as she spun herself wildly with the spiked rocket-propelled hammer orbiting around her at a very high speed.

Pheros tries to deflect the attack with blasts of Arcwind but it was not effective in slowing down the Lissa Tornado. The Lissanado.

So she has to settle with dodging it instead, which was oddly easy to accomplish as the Lissanado was not fully capable of targeting itself.

That being said, Lissa did end up smashing her oversized hammer into the fortress's stone wall. Given that this is a story somewhat rooted in reality, the resulting shock numbed Lissa's arms and caused her to drop her hammer.

"I've got you!" Pheros yells and lunges with her sword.

"Ow ow ow ow…" Lissa was too focused on shaking out the numbness from her arms and would not have seen Pheros' charge had she not announced it out loud.

Since she did though, Lissa spun low and swept at Pheros's leg with a kick, causing Pheros to break the charge and hop back.

Strictly speaking, although Pheros was a Valkyrie she was also a trained soldier, and thus her experience would far outstrip Lissa's.

Lissa, however, was taught (not on purpose, mind) by the Phoenix to fight dirty. She was pretty good at fighting dirty. Between the hammer, her small frame, and the fact that Chrom was ready to jump in (the threat of which distracts Pheros), the two were evenly matched.

Well…strictly speaking they were evenly matched, but every time Pheros tried to use her sword instead of her magic Lissa would either dissuade it through punching the Valkyrie outright, so Lissa's a little bit ahead.

In the end, though…

"Alright, alright." Pheros drops the hilt of her sword as her spellbook shreds itself in her hand. "I surrender."

Lissa was huffing pretty hard too. "Good." Her hammer was smoking, and her dress was cut in multiple locations.

"Took you long enough, Lisse." Robin waves from the broken door. "We've already cleaned up the rest of the fortress."

"Eeeh? Already?!" Lissa exclaims. "We were only at it for ten minutes!"

"You took my entire fortress in ten minutes!?" Pheros exclaims. "What are you people?!"

"We are the Shepherds." Chrom declares. "Well…Shepherds plus a little extra." He taps the radio on his ear. "These things are very handy."

_In game effect: Custom Shepherds' Radio: extends adjacency effects to three tiles and doubles its effect (Hit+10 becomes Hit+20)._

"I'm a little worried Ash shortchanged his own squad by making this for me." Robin mutters. She's wearing what appears to be a pair of glasses with lens that are tinted green.

"And here I foolishly imagined you to be shortsighted after all the reading you do." Miriel smiles just a little bit.

_In game effect: Robin's EWACS. All allies gain Galeforce (stacks with the skill itself). The first attack of all allied units during the player's turn activates any combat skills they have (i.e. Astra). All allies within two tiles of Robin take half damage. It's exactly as bullshit as it sounds._

"It burns my face when I use it too much though." Robin sighs and pockets the EWAC glasses, showing a pair of red stripes near her temples. "It's also really heavy."

Yarne coughs. "Report." Robin nods for him to continue. "We've freed all of the rebel leaders, and rebel forces are approaching from all sides. We'll be able to hand over the fortress before the day is over."

"Good." Chrom nods.

Robin, however, catches the corner of Pheros's mouth twitch slightly. _A trap? Or is there something else here? _"Severa, did Ash say anything else about Steiger Fortress?"

"Uh…" Severa thinks on it for a minute. "Something about a fatass bribing the rebels to rebel, I think."

Robin caught the expression on Pheros's face. "So that was right?" She grins. "Damn, he's good. What do we do now, Chrom? That rebel army's going to turn on us for the smallest of reasons."

"Let them." Chrom answers immediately. "Our goal is Walhart."

"Have you come to kill for peace as well?" Pheros asks. "Not so different from Walhart…and very different from your sister."

"We fight to liberate the oppressed." Chrom replies automatically. "We care not for territory."

"Are you sure?" Pheros sneers. "Didn't that Lord of the Coasts capture and hold a Valmese City?"

"Bed pardon, milady." Virion holds up a finger. "That city is a part of the nation of Rosanne, and is thus under my jurisdiction. To lend it to Ash temporarily is of no importance."

_So Ash is the Lord's name. _Pheros narrows her eyes. _But he's currently fighting in the City, isn't he? So the town can't be too well defended. _"How lighthearted of you, Fleeing Duke."

"It will take some time for that name to vanish, it seems." Virion laughs bitterly. "But I assure you, my decisions were never made on levity."

"What should we do about her, anyways?" Lissa asks with a point of her hammer to Pheros. "I know Ash wanted her alive, but did he say why?"

Phero's eyes narrowed. "If the Lord of the Coasts did not ask for my life, what would you have done, Prince Chrom?"

"The resulting battle would've been much faster and would've resulted in your death." Robin says dispassionately. "Ash has been exercising a strategy of saving Valm's talent, for some reason."

_What's that about? _Pheros was confused. "He…is?"

"Your good captains are coming home day after day despite the month of raiding, no?" Robin shrugs. "He's got something in mind, whatever it is." Robin knew what Ash was planning but figured exposing it to the (currently) enemy general was a bad idea. "He wanted the garrison commander of Steiger Fortress alive specifically though, so there's something special about you."

"Ash _does _have a thing for women, though…his retainers are pretty much all women." Cynthia points out. "So maybe he just likes her?"

_She doesn't respect him, does she. _Pheros withheld her sigh. _Pitiful._

"Given that he didn't even know her name, I find that unlikely." Robin said plainly. "Alright, let's proceed onto the next phase of the plan."

"We still have a plan?" Chrom echoes everyone in the room.

"Yes, it's called 'looting the place'." Anna grins. "Now hop to it! Gaius! Don't leave anything behind!"

"You got it, Honeypot." Gaius grins. "I'll pick the place clean."

"Don't touch the fort's necessities." Robin warns them. "We need this place functioning after we're done."

…

…

[Rebel Leaders]

…

…

"So it looks like they really are doing what Excellus said they would." Rebel Leader A (Warrior) grumbled. "Maybe all the other shit he said was true, too."

"Pah." Rebel Leader B (Swordmaster) spat. "That shithead just wants us to bleed for Valm."

"Better you than me." Rebel Leader C (Hero) grins. "When all of you die out we'll take what's left."

"Even a month in the dungeons didn't cure your mouth, apparently." Leader A snickers. "They were even nice enough to give us weapons…they're quite stupid, apparently."

The three of them then heard footsteps around the corner of the rather spacious room they were occupying and elected to stay silent.

Severa, on patrol, stopped when she came to their door.

"What do you want, twin tails?" Leader C asks gruffly.

"We didn't give you weapons out of negligence, mister rebel." Severa huffs, making all three of them freeze. "For the record, we know what you're planning, so at least pretend to have some class while you plot."

Robin had taken the liberty of attaching a radio to the bottom of the table in their room.

"How…can she read minds?" Leader B mutters as Severa walks away.

"I heard some people say that the twin tails hairstyle and a short skirt offers some kind of mythical power." Leader C says. "I guess it's true."

_Where the hell did you hear that?! _Severa stomps away, red faced.

…

[Afternoon]

…

Chrom finds Robin glaring towards the direction of Steiger City.

"Any news from Ash?" He asks after greeting her.

"Not a thing. I'm worried." Robin clenches and unclenches her fist repeatedly. "I really thought he would've established total control by now."

"You saw how General Pheros reacted when you brought up the Lord of the Coasts." Chrom replies. "It's safe to say that…hell, it's probably due to his reputation that we were able to take Steiger Fortress so easily." He frowns. "If they've taken the preparations against him according to his reputation, then he's definitely having a harder time than we are."

"Damn." Robin sighs. "Maybe we should've split our forces more?"

Chrom laughs softly. "Much as I hate to admit it, we Shepherds are only a drop in the bucket unless we had a singular objective to attack…and I feel like a city would have multiples of those."

"Yeah." Robin resists the urge to attack the wall she was leaning on.

"What's wrong?" Chrom asks when he notices Robin looking downcast.

"Well…" Robin sighs. "I've heard from Nowi that Ash's been having trouble sleeping."

"Yeah?"

Robin nods. "It's safe to say that the stress is taking a toll on him. According to how she said it, it's been a long time since he's been ok, too." She scratches her head. "Add in the fact that he's apparently showing signs of magical corruption…"

Chrom blinks in surprise. "He is? He's pushing himself that badly?" He then stops and thinks for a minute. "Wait, what's magical corruption again? Should we be worried about it?"

"We should be fine." Robin assures him. "Magical corruption occurs whenever someone uses magic they aren't attuned with…so if I were to use healing magic without the proper training as a cleric, the effects will eventually set in, and healing magic will be less useful when used on my body."

"And I'm assuming it's different for each type of magic, right?" Chrom guesses.

"Correct, Sir Chrom." Miriel joins into the conversation. "In Ash's case, based on the data I collected before we departed, he's suffering from…well, the corruption based on the usage from every form of magic, as well as some forms I am not familiar with."

"To top it off, there's some dark thing hanging around him." Robin adds. "Whatever that thing is, it's accelerating the rate of corruption, and since he's an Outrealmer, his body never properly adjusted before he started using magic, and thus he can't recognize the symptoms of corruptions…likely until it's far too late."

"Did you warn him?" Chrom asks the two.

"When he was flying his 'missions' day in and day out, there never was a chance." Robin sighs. "And every time we had off time he'd worry himself sick over the girls that got even the slightest injury."

"It is a little infuriating to watch." Miriel laughs. "I believe we all want to be doted on every once in a while."

"Um…" Chrom wants them to get back on topic. "What's going to happen to Ash if the corruption continues?"

Robin sighs harder. "Best case scenario? He dies. From what I can tell the corruption reached a fatal point long before this campaign even started, so I'm at a loss for how he's alive."

"That's…quite bleak." Chrom turns a little pale. "Ash dying from his magic is the _best_ case scenario? More importantly, when did you have the time to check for this corruption?"

"Well, whenever he actually slept." Robin shrugs. "It's impressively hard, given how light of a sleeper he is."

"You've been sneaking into his room?" Chrom can't help but ask. "What?"

"Well…to be fair, Tiki does the same, so I feel like I should be able to do too." Robin grins.

Chrom was not quite sure at the logic. "Anyways…?"

"Speaking of Tiki, it's fair to say that whatever is causing her to sneak into his room at night is the same thing that's stopping Ash from succumbing to the corruption." Robin says. "I wish I knew what it was though."

"Ash seemed certain that the force involved is something detrimental." Miriel adds. "Perhaps something related to Grima."

"Grima?" Chrom echoes. "Is he worried about Plegia? Or, rather, the Grimleal?"

"Seems like it. That's why he's keeping the good Valmese leaders alive, after all." Robin taps the stones of the wall with her fingers. "He's considering a second war against the Grimleal a given." _ I do too. _She adds in her mind.

"And Tiki's attracted to that? Why?" Chrom asks.

"It's just a theory." Robin reminds him. "It's not as if we can find any concrete proof either, given how odd this entire situation is. That being said, I do believe that whatever this dark element is, it's what's causing Tiki to gravitate to him."

_Whatever that dark element is, it's different from my blood. _Robin wanted to add. _I don't know what it is._

"Can we prevent the corruption from spreading further?" Chrom asks at last.

"Impossible." Miriel shakes her head sadly. "At this point, his health condition is a foregone conclusion."

"…so what's the worst possible outcome, if Ash dying is the best?" Chrom wonders.

"Uhm…" Robin scratches her head. "This is also just an assumption, but the in worst case scenario he goes insane."

Chrom wasn't quite sure how "That's…worse?"

"Yes, sir." Miriel nods. "It is my understanding that Ash is currently consciously restricting the methods of how he utilizes magic…should he shake off these shackles, we will not be able to stop him."

Chrom was put off by how sure she sounded. "What do you mean, 'we won't be able to stop him'?" He glances at Robin.

Robin simply taps the radio earpiece. "Think of all the things he's made."

Chrom thought back to the bombs Ash's squadron of Pegasus Knights carried. "If he turns against us, he will kill all of us, huh…"

"It's a matter of 'when'." Miriel sighs. "I don't want to believe it."

Chrom hated himself for saying the following words. "Do we have a plan for when that happens?"

Robin felt the same way. "Apart from assassinating him before he turns…no. Once he does…" She taps the radio earpiece again. "Approaching him undetected will be impossible."

She recalls back to one day during the month of raiding where she asked Ash what he could do if he were fighting at the absolute peak of his abilities.

…

_"Well…for starters?" Ash had thought it over. "I already know how to mark targets so that spells will home in on their positions, so…" He pats his airman rifle. "Something like this combined with that would get the most usage…an ultra-high velocity homing railgun. With exploding rounds, or something."_

_"Sounds like you're holding back on us, then." Robin had grinned at the time to hide her discomfort (and confusion)._

_"A little, yeah." Ash nods. "We're here to dethrone an emperor, not to annihilate a nation. Besides, going all out against other humans when we have Risen showing up every night is just bad manners."_

_…_

_And if he stops caring, it's entirely possible that we humans as a race would be in danger. _Robin thought with a sigh. "For the time being, I'd like to keep this quiet."

Chrom nods. "Of course…there's little point in entertaining in assumptions against our own friends."

"Lord Chrom." Maribelle shows up with a slight curtsey. "The rebel troops have been spotted. They will reach the fortress shortly."

Chrom nods. "Alright, thank you, Maribelle. Let's depart, before we end up getting stuck here."

…

…

Ultimately, Steiger Fortress fulfilled its role as a fixing force against the Valmese army when the rebel forces found it abandoned and cleared out, thus projecting themselves as a major threat against their enemy.

Unfortunately the rebels were really bad at playing nicely with each other and were thus constantly weakening their own position through constant infighting, to the point where Steiger Fortress fell back into Valmese control shortly before the end of the war.

Sucks to be them, I guess? But we don't care about those guys after Chapter 17.

…

…

Following their capture of Steiger Fortress, the Shepherds left it to the Rebels and departed with the intention of assisting their allies at Steiger City. Since the attack had been repelled, however, the Shepherds opted instead to move closer towards the ultimate goal of the Valmese capital.

Their trip was made a hell of lot harder by the presence of what felt like every soldier of Valm stationed between Steiger City and the Capital. Robin figured that the extra soldiers were a precaution against Ash in case he actually broke the city.

With the understanding that a direct attack against an unknown number of soldiers was all but impossible, Chrom opted to instead set up camp near an ex-Rosannite village and collect information instead.

Strictly speaking though, they made their decision in the afternoon of their attack and have made their camp at night about an hour ago.

"Hey, Blue." Gaius says upon his return. "I found out some interesting things." Chrom nods for him to continue. "The village is in an uproar, apparently they've heard about Steiger being hit and they're collectively rallying and rising up. A riot's going to break out in the village if things continue."

Robin raises an eyebrow. "Really? What about the garrison?"

"The Valmese garrison is on a skeleton crew." Gaius grins. "They pooled all their resources to defend the city…sounds to me like our boy did a lot of damage last month."

Robin smiles. "He did enough damage to make them put every man they had between him and the city…the city itself is still under Valmese control, right? So when will the garrisons moving back to their positions?" She asks next. "They won't be staying still now that Ash has been proven to be far from invincible."

"Well, that…" Gaius stops when their camp is suddenly flooded with light.

All of the Shepherds look up to see a smattering of eyes in the sky dropping something big and blobby before disappearing again.

"Manaketes." Nowi says in a small voice. "Those are Risen Manaketes…"

"I guess…not for a while." Gaius gulps. "What do we do, Blue?"

"The closest Manakete landed in that village." Chrom unsheathes Falchion. "We move."

.

.

.

{ === + === }

Author Notes:

Way shorter than the other one, because the Shepherds are just better.


	36. Valm Campaign - Path De-Split

{ === + === }

…

[Steiger City, Night of Allied Force Retreat, 3rd Person Camera]

…

Nino had become separated from the rest of her forces earlier in the day, and she cursed herself for having missed her rendezvous with the main force before they had to pull out.

As thing stand, she was stranded in the enemy city with no way to break out.

Nino mentally tallies her current situation. _The city garrison's on high alert, but they're not running patrols…however, the city's populace are in a high state of alertness, so if I behave oddly they will likely send the garrison after me._

She sighs. "If the safest place to be is the slums, then I'm going to be in trouble…"

She then saw a dashing young man beckon to her from around a corner. Realizing that he was motioning for her to join him and slightly making a mockery of her initial distrust of shady people in shadier places, she decided to follow after him.

He led her into a rundown, empty tavern.

"You came here with the attacking force, right?" The young man asks her with a wry smile. "It's a little late for a pretty lass like yourself to be running about."

Nino was ready to kick ass and take names, and her hands glowed with the telltale crackle of an Arcthunder.

"Whoa! Relax." The young man raises his hands up in surrender. "I'm not your enemy."

_You're impressively creepy. _Nino responds in her head and doesn't drop her guard.

"Good job, Inigo." Another young man with spiky hair and a yellow Swordmaster outfit claps his hands. "This is the first time you've made a girl your enemy right after opening your mouth."

"Shut it, Owain." Inigo sulks. "We just got off on the wrong foot."

Owain makes a sweeping motion, as if to say 'look at this place.'

Inigo blushes. "Alright, yeah, maybe bringing her to an abandoned inn wasn't the best idea."

"Let me stop my partner from embarrassing himself further." Owain bows apologetically to Nino. "You're with the Shepherds, right?"

"Phoenix…but otherwise, yes." Nino drops her guard a fraction.

"Phoenix?" Inigo muses. "Never heard of it."

"The immortal god-bird that rise from the ashes!" Owain…er, does his thing. "Sounds like something our boss would do, alright."

"It's something you would do." Inigo mutters. "But…I do admit it sounds like a sub-unit only our boss would create."

"You two know Ash?" Nino asks.

"Maybe we do, maybe we don't." Owain says mysteriously. "Who's asking?"

"Yes we do." Inigo cuts over her overly dramatic friend. "I assume you need our help, miss…"

"Nino."

Inigo puts his hands over his heart. "Such a pure, lovely name!"

Nino was no stranger. "Enough. What can the two of you tell me about the city?"

Owain ignores Inigo deflating. "After that last battle, they're suitably on edge. Sneaking out of the city would be impossible, even for someone with my considerable talents."

"Your best chances of escape would involve waiting for a better opportunity." Inigo says diplomatically. "I know this place doesn't look like much, but the two of us use it as our base of operations in Valm. Please rest assured that you will be safe here."

He then caught the doubtful look Nino shot him.

"I swear that I am not that depraved." Inigo sighs. "My word, does everyone doubt me?"

"If you dropped your skirt chasing habits, we wouldn't." Owain says under his breath.

…

[Current Time, 1st Person Camera]

…

We're heading back to Steiger City to intercept the incoming Risen Manaketes.

Our party consists of: Say'ri, Tiki, Henry, Nah, Hawk, Morgan.

_That's actually a full party._

Plus us.

_It's a full party with an escorted NPC._

A very skewed party, sure…what, Say'ri's the frontliner, I'm the backliner, and everyone else deal damage? Not a healer in sight.

_Pretty sure Hawk can heal._

That's not really the point right now though.

_So what's the point right now?_

The point right now is that I wish the wagon we're riding has suspension.

"You're not hitting every rock on our way, are ya?" Hawk asks as our asses become separated from the wagon's seating for the millionth time. "Drive better, Henry."

"The horsie likes a path with ups and downs!" Henry laughs. "I'm just telling it to keep itself on the road!"

"Well tell it to keep its path better!" Say'ri rubs her behind. "This wagon's going to end us before we reach the Risen."

I'm regretting not equipping my weapons and having it carried in the carriage right now, because I'm pretty sure putting on like an extra sixty pounds will definitely glue my ass to the ow bench.

_Or just make it hurt more._

Yeah, I guess.

…

_After about, oh, an hour of suffering (where Henry mercifully drove slower) we arrive at a safe enough place to stop and observe._

"Never again." Hawk mutters and hops down the wagon.

"Hey! It wasn't that bad." Henry complains after having had the gall to tie himself down to the wagon to avoid bouncing. "It's better than having to run here the whole way."

God I hate his boundless optimism.

"Now that we're here…" Nah valiantly tries to get our minds back on track. "Where are the Risen?"

Actually I'm not sure if she's trying to rerail us or if she's just bloodthirsty, but we're a bit more focused now, so whatever works.

_We all just stand around and look around. Y'know, masterful scouting._

"If they're not around here, then we'll just swing right by and go after Chrom instead." I shrug. "If the city's not in danger then they can reinforce themselves in a few weeks."

Hawk glares at me. "You bombed their granaries."

…Oh yeah.

"Ok, fair point. They'll scatter and then reinforce themselves in a few weeks." I do my headscratching. "Nah, can you go up?"

"Yep." Nah starts her engines and zooms into the air. She stays up for about five seconds before coming back down. "Risen detachment to our northwest. One Dragon sighted."

…well, I suppose it's faster than calling it a Risen Manakete.

"See? I knew what I was doing." Henry grins and grabs his tome.

I just realized that half of the current party has mental health quirks.

_Half counting Tiki or us?_

Uh…yes.

…

Anyways, after a short, brisk walk, we stealthily app

Ahahaha that's bullshit

We saw the group of ten or so Risen (Myrimdons and Sorcerers) plus one Risen Manakete wandering in the general direction of the city. We saw them, and then Hawk and Tiki immediately engaged despite being outside their maximum range.

Points to Hawk: his Thoron actually hit a target, though it didn't seem to do any damage.

"The hell's wrong with you two?!" I managed to ask before shifting gears. "Nah! Support them!"

"Right!"

…

Fun fact: the two of them didn't actually need support. Hawk wiped the little guys with his absurdly powerful Thorons. Tiki transformed into her dragon form and cut the Risen Manakete in half.

"I'm glad that's taken care of…though I imagined the threat to be bigger." Say'ri commented.

She then went on to address Hawk. "I'm surprised that someone as unassuming as you would be as powerful as the Speaker."

"Hey, I'm not as powerful as she is. I just got the little guys." Hawk had replied very nonchalantly.

…but it still is a valid point. Sure, he wasn't engaging the Manakete, but he did sweep the smaller enemies with (next to) zero effort on his part.

_To be fair, that's not saying much. With our current loadout and experience we would've swept them, too._

It would've taken us longer. Slightly longer, but longer.

"Regardless, we got this batch of Risen." I look to Tiki. "Do we have any more we need to worry about?"

Tiki just shrugs. "Maybe."

…and now I'm coming to the realization that a third of our party undergoes dramatic moodswings. Or whatever it is that Tiki's afflicted with.

Either way, Tiki isn't psychic and all-seeing, and I shouldn't act as if she's psychic and all seeing. "Ok then, we'll slowly swing up north and take out any Risen groups that we find."

…

So we do.

…

Like, it was a series of random encounters with bands of Risen, and the bands are almost all a batch of prepromotes, a promoted unit, and then the itself.

Tiki or Nah would take turns stomping on the while the rest of us stomped out the rest.

Y'know, standard.

…

…

We killed the Risen in a wide circle far from the city's walls, and eventually we ended up north of the city.

I feel like it would've been far more theatrically appropriate if we showed up in the middle of a large scale battle instead of eliminating small pockets of enemies before they could congregate.

_True, but then it would just be a revisit of the Steiger City siege._

Yeah…also wishing for a more climatic battle at the cost of a few hundred lives is a little mean.

"Did anybody else notice how they were all protecting the blob dragons?" Henry points out as we finish up killing the latest group of Risen.

Hmm. "No? I don't think we left any of them alive long enough to make that observation."

"Sorry about that." Hawk says without missing a beat or any semblance of shame.

"But you do agree, right, princess?" Henry asks Tiki, who just yawns.

I hope she doesn't fall asleep while we rendezvous with the main cast.

"They didn't do too good of a job if they were." Tiki replies sleepily. "Are there any more? I'm tired."

I wonder if her exhaustion is her…whatever is affecting her, acting up.

Judging by Say'ri's aside glance aimed at me she thinks the same.

I take a deep breath and call out into the sky. "Nah, you see anything?"

"It doesn't look like we have any other targets within range." Nah calls from her perch above the treetops. "Picture is clear, as they say."

_Hah._

The only one who use that term around here is me. "Alright, good work." I then address everyone else. "We should move to reinforce Chrom and the others, then."

_Aren't we forgetting someone?_

Nino…should be ok. If our team of five goes for the rescue, the forces still concentrated at Steiger City will overwhelm us.

_It's not like you're fighting the entire army by yourselves._

True…but Steiger's on a heightened sense of security, and probably will stay that way once the local populace starts rioting due to food shortages. Nino's smart enough to keep her head down, and if she runs into someone not-friendly she's smart enough to make that someone not-alive while attracting not-attention.

_What would not-attention be, anyways?_

I dunno. Facebook Likes? Point being, Nino's safer right now without our interference…and besides, in a worst case scenario losing the Shepherds is a bigger deal.

…

_So we leave and head north._

…

[3rd Person Camera]

…

The Shepherds had busied themselves with defending the village against the Risen threat, with Nowi legitimately transforming for the first time.

_Reactions ranged from "So that's why she was so powerful" to "Holy fucking shit the little kid is actually a dragon"._

While the villagers were grateful that the threat to their village was summarily removed, the fact remained that the Shepherds were an opposing force…and one of the villagers had asked for reinforcements.

Ergo, the town's original garrison showed up with an extra army, and numbered around 400 men.

Robin, not wanting to engage with an army that can call bigger armies, wisely escaped from the village while relations were still good.

…

As such, the Shepherds were currently hiding somewhere in Valm's woodlands while steadily moving southwest.

"Chrom." Robin gets the brooding lord's attention. "What's on your mind?"

Chrom shows her a small, bright gem in his hand. "These…Risen abominations." He sighs.

Robin nods. "The sooner we finish this war, the better; I imagine Ylisse's going to have bigger troubles than we are if more of these things show up."

"If they are as powerful as Nowi when she is transformed…then our knights will have a tough fight ahead of them." Fredrick agrees, looking a little…

Robin frowns. "Are you burnt, Fredrick?"

Fredrcik scratches his face nervously. "I may have strayed too close to the fire."

Robin looks a bit confused, until the source of the fire (one winged Nowi) zipped over their heads. She glances at Nowi and then grins at Fredrick. "So how did that go?"

Fredrick sighs as Nowi lands on his shield (and then slips and falls off). "Complete defeat. I cannot fathom the amount of force required to defeat a Manakete."

"Good thing the Risen one is squishier than I am!" Nowi pinches her own face. "They're not even Manaketes either. Boo."

That got Robin's attention. "What do you mean?"

Nowi dusts herself off. "I dunno."

"You don't…what?" Robin scowls.

"They're more like…power?" Nowi fiddles with her hair. "It's like someone gathered up a lot of blood and gave it a stone, and then poof." She spreads her arms for effect. "It's a mass of big bad thing."

Robin frowns. "Can you be more specific?"

"To be honest, I really don't know." Nowi switches out of her playful child personality. "There are too many weird things going on. I don't even know if the one we fought is the same type Ash's worried about."

_Not the same type… _Robin looks around for… "Hey! Yarne! Come here for a bit!"

…

"I can tell you it wasn't the same type I fought." Yarne summarizes. "It wasn't solid enough and it definitely wasn't smart enough to even be your normal Risen."

Robin had trouble believing that. "A normal Risen is smart?"

"Well…smart enough to know how to attack." Yarne nods. "That one just let Lady Nowi beat on it."

"Yep!" Nowi flashes a Victory sign. "It was easy, too."

"How many different types of Risen are there?" Chrom asks. "It seems like we're meeting a new group every other day."

"I imagine the groups aren't too familiar with each other." Robin sighs. "More to the point, if the Risen are going to get progressively stronger as time passes, then it's in our best interest to win this war as quickly as we can."

"What do we do about the Risen?" Chrom asks next. "How do we tackle the Risen threat after we're done with Valm?"

Robin just frowns at him. "You've talked with Tiki about this, right?"

Chrom returns a blank (and somewhat sheepish) stare.

Robin pats the lord on the shoulder. "When you get the chance, do so."

"Sounds like you haven't talked to her about this either." Chrom observes after hearing the distinct lack of advice.

Robin doesn't dignify Chrom's truthful observation with a response.

_She's banking on Ash handling that problem for the foreseeable future._

A fluttering of wings tells them that Sumia has returned from her scouting trip.

"Chrom…and Lady Robin." Sumia gives a salute. "There's a Valm camp northwest of here, and a Risen force south of here…the Risen is closer to us, but they're moving away."

"Ok." Robin consults a map given to her by a villager and traces her finger on one of the little roads on it. "We'll follow this path southwest and then swing westwards here." She jabs the map. "That should both let us get away and lead our chasers away from the Risen group."

"We can't attack them?" Chrom wasn't too happy about leaving vapor zombies roaming freely.

Robin shakes her head. "We're already choked for time."

"Damn." Chrom sighs. "Alright, we're moving out."

…

[1st Person Camera]

…

So…we…

_For the record we should never be allowed to go anywhere unsupervised because this is incredibly stupid_

We head north of Steiger while picking a direction somewhat at random because we might end up running into Chrom. Like holy shit I know I've taken actions without plans but this is probably the dumbest thing we ever did.

_And it works._

We ran into a village that was apparently saved by a group of 'enemies'. Said 'enemies' contained, in no particular order: A girl with dragon wings, a girl possessed by a demon, a shirtless man, sexy dark mage lady, and Chrom.

_Wait, how did they know about_

Chrom introduced himself. I'm sure Fredrick had a heart attack at that point.

So the following things happened when we visited the village.

Say'ri almost got us into a fight with the local garrison.

Tiki got us out of the fight with the local garrison. She had to remain neutral, but ended up punching the garrison captain through two houses and a wall. I paid for a Recover Staff.

We found out where Chrom was headed to.

We also found out that the army sent to siege my town isn't Cervante's, as Tiki recognized some of the garrison troops as crack troops belonging to said Cervantes. Said crack troops were frequent visitors to the Naga Tree and were instrumental in stopping us from getting in a fight with the rest of the troops.

"I was wrong." Tiki had said simply when I asked her about this. "I saw a large Armored Knight with gleaming red armor before I left."

Hmm. That's…well, alright, I guess. If Cervantes was at my city, then it would've meant that Yen'fay would've been around here, which would've made my life infinitely easier.

That being said, I did leave backup plans in the form of Ninya, so it should be fine…well, it will be fine. They're smart, and our city has stocks upon stocks of guns.

However, just to be sure, I gave Morgan orders to return to the city and assist with the defense and recruiting of Yen'fay. Suffice to say he wasn't too happy about being given a reassignment out of the blue like that.

_Morgan's agreement came with the caveat of "I expect my mother home safe and sound by the time this is over."_

…

"Why did you want to see my brother?" Say'ri asked (a bit vehemently) when we left the village. "What could he offer you?"

"I want him to stand the fuck down." I reply (a bit vehemently as well). "He…ok, reveal time."

_Say'ri is confused._

"Yen'fay is in the Valmese army to keep you alive." I do a double-hand-index-finger-point thing at Say'ri for emphasis.

Say'ri looks momentarily lost for words. "That's absurd." She finally says in _serious_ disbelief.

Welp. "What was the first thing you did when Chon'sin was taken over?" I ask her.

"I organized a rebelling force and struck back at the invaders." Say'ri replied proudly. "We almost succeeded, too."

"Suceeded doing what, taking over a castle?" I frown.

"Valm was slow on their retaliation." Say'ri nods. "We could've secured the entire capital had my brother not turned on us."

Well. "Did you ever think about why Valm was slow?"

…Judging by the silence, that's a no.

"I imagine Yen'fay switched sides because it would be easier to keep track of Valm's movements as their General." I say. "Think of how quickly you would've died if Valm spent far more manpower taking you down than they did."

Say'ri is…stubborn. "Until I hear it from his mouth, I do not believe you."

I think that's about the best I can expect. "Fair enough. For the time being, worry about Cervantes. He's the one closer, after all."

…

So, about where the Shepherds are going.

Apparently they're going to visit a shrine to the southwest of the Chapter…20, 21? Whichever one was the front gate of Valm. As for why, I can't tell. I'll have to ask when we get there.

_So what equipment are we using? We haven't been shown fighting yet._

Er…yeah, about that.

_So what did you bring to the party?_

I have a Steel Sword, my airman's rifle, and my spellbook. These are my default weapons. I wish I could say "I have all this cool prototype gear that I made off-camera" but, y'know, I spent my month either flying raids or passed out on a mattress, so not much development happened. What optional equipment I did bring are just straight upgrades to what I already had.

For example, my jet shoes are upgraded with efficient thrusters. I can now skate faster.

The Thor anti-ground cannon (which I technically wasn't supposed to take but hey I'm the boss I make the rules) got a straight upgrade into what I'm calling the Ragnarok anti-ground cannon. Bigger bang, bigger boom, bigger accuracy dropoff if I try to fire it while moving.

_It's also water cooled, which is nifty._

I also have a remade Chain Greatsword. The smiths broke the weapon down to its core functionality and rebuilt it from the ground up with metalsmithing expertise I did not have…and combined it with the knowledge I did have.

End result: a two-meter long behemoth of a sword that spins fast enough to cut through solid stone forever.

_Caveat?_

Maintenance is a bitch. I'm familiar enough with the weapon to strip it down and piece it back together in twenty minutes, but the parts for it…I need to carry a bag of parts like the last chainsword, but since the weapon is larger I need to carry more parts. Thus, carrying enough parts to service the weapon for any long-term engagement becomes impossible.

…Which means I can only use this awesome murderweapon on targets that I cannot subdue by other means.

It's not that big of a deal, since I now have a lot more ways of causing murder and/or paralysis at my disposal. It's still annoying, though.

_So what spells are we packing?_

All of them.

…I should take a second to explain how we keep doing the 'tap pocket spellbook' thingy. I don't remember if I actually covered this or not, but currently we use pocket spellbooks that have basic spell circles inscribed into them to act as a fast holder for our spells. We then load said spellbook with loose leaf spell paper, and those spell paper carry the other spell circles, and then we can use them as necessary.

This does mean that I'm carrying around stacks of loose-leaf paper like a goddamn college student. A college student with the ability to bend minds to his will.

…

Where were we?

_Plot._

Oh, right.

…

Following after Chrom's footsteps took us the better part of two days. Our progress was constantly hampered by Valmese patrols everywhere. The occasional Risen showed up as well, but more often than not Valmese regulars will get to them first. I'm sorry to admit that we have launched surprise attacks against those Valmese troops when they were tired from taking out Risen, but at the end of the day we have places to go, people to meet.

_Why haven't we met them yet?_

I imagine it's because Chrom gets first dibs? The Shepherds kick ass and leave, and Valm sends in forces after the fact. We then get caught by said forces and have to tread carefully or be overwhelmed.

…not having Robin's foresight in our party hurts us too, I guess.

…

[3rd Day of Following]

…

Aaaaaa this is boring. And painful. But mostly just boring.

"Yet another roundabout path." Say'ri very helpfully mutters to the map in her hands. "At this rate, we'll never catch up to them."

"I really thought they would just stay still for a little bit." I place a mat down next to her and crash. "Though I guess the fact that they're so active is a good thing."

"Perhaps you're giving the Risen too much credit." Say'ri mutters. "Where do we go next?"

"We go south." Hawk hops down from his viewing tree. "Guess why."

Say'ri just sighs. "Very well."

I tap my radio. "Nah, is there anything south of us?"

"South? Uh…"

_Nah spends some time trying to find out where South is compared to her current facing._

"There's a village." Nah reports back. "It doesn't seem to be particularly big."

Ok then.

"It also seems to be under attack."

…fuck.

"Should we interfere?" Nah sounds very unsure of her question.

I'm not making this call, because I know what call I'll make. "Say'ri?"

Her response was a snappy "Yes."

Ok then, detour time. "Hawk!"

"Yep." He grins and unfolds the map. "Our job is to lead our pursuers into the village so they can join the battle against whatever hostile elements are inside it, right?" He traces his finger on the map. "Going here would be the best idea."

I tap my radio again. "Nah, can you tell what the village is being attacked by?"

"Unknown." She replies. "But given how close we are to Valm's core territory, the likelihood of it being a rogue Valmese army is low."

"She's talking more and more like you." Hawk remarks. "Is it a curse?"

Eyeroll. "Shush. Let's get a move on before our window closes. Nah, come down and rest…and good work out there."

…

We follow a slightly circuitous path southwest of our current position (while keeping close to the treelines, because why the hell not). We also make sure to keep our pace steady so our chasers can gain on us…before finally increasing speed to aim directly at the village again.

It's a small place, maybe a few hundred residents, tops.

It's also on fire.

Again, why is everything touched by Risen on fire?

Hawk peers into the village as we circle the outer edges of its farmlands. "I see Revenants and a few Heroes. Do we just dance out here?"

"I would love to be able to." I reply. "But given the circumstances…you're cleared to engage, but don't get dragged in."

…of course, Say'ri already charged towards the village even while I spoke, so it's not like I had any authority.

She really embraces that 'hero of the people' thing, huh?

_Why is Tiki not charging?_

She's…unstable, apparently, and is thus napping in the back of our wagon for the moment.

"Don't lose her lordship." Hawk grins at me and follows after Say'ri.

_Henry and Nah follow after him, and they engage in the village beyond my line of sight._

I get to drive the wagon to the western edge of the village without being sighted…and of course I've already failed because fucking Risen Snipers. WELL THEN

_We unhook our rifle, enchant the horses, and then take aim at the snipers. Wait._

I'm enchanting the horses to protect their ears. This prevents them from panicking when I fire the Ragnarok without having to move too far from the wagon.

…

Three shots later, we have Risen tree paste instead of snipers.

And it is good.

…

"Good mornin'." Tiki yawns after another five minutes of bumpy driving. "Where did everybody go?"

I point to the village that's almost burned to the ground. "There."

She just…kind of stares blankly. "Oh."

And not for the first time, I wish I knew what's up with her mental state. I know she sleeps a lot and is mentally out of it like 99% of the time. The rest of the time she's as sharp as anyone else and is pretty pleasant company.

…And now she's using my back as a lean-to. Wonderful. "You feeling ok?"

She makes a noise and sighs sleepily.

Well, I mean…I reached my rendezvous point, so I have nothing to do.

_And thus we cuddle with Tiki and a blanket, because obviously why not._

Because in about five seconds she's going to arrest my arm and choke the hell out of aaand there she goes. My right arm is now stolen and is in her tight clutches.

_So we pet her head with our left hand._

"Why do you feel so calm?" Tiki mutters sleepily. "And it's so warm."

…

This would be a hundred times cuter if she wasn't…y'know.

…

Something's coming this way.

…

Tiki

Tiki please let go of my arm

I can't stop us from being killed if you're squeezing it

Ok ow you're squeezing it harder

Fuck

Also my arm is between your breasts so if you could

Not squeeze it harder

Or squeeze it harder

I don't know

My arm has lost all feeling

Also there is something coming this way

TIKI

_Y'know if you moved your hand you could reach down and-_

Train of thought not good

_But you COULD-_

DERAIL THAT TRAIN GODDAMMIT

FOCUS

FOCUS ON THE THINGS COMING FROM THE LEFT THAT MAY OR MAY NOT BE HOSTILE

ALSO I CAN'T REALLY AIM WITH MY LEFT ARM

SHIT

_Why are you yelling in your head?_

BECAUSE TIKI IS SOFT AND IT IS IMMENSELY DISTRACTING TO MY ABILITIES OF CONCENTRATION AND NOT DEATH

_So I guess this means you can't cast a spell in your current state?_

NOT WHEN THE SPELLBOOK IS INACCESSIBLE DUE TO TIKI BEING IN THE WAY

SHIT

SHIT

…

[3rd Person Camera]

…

A single Valmese Cavalier shot out from the trees and landed in front of the wagon.

The rider and Ash shared a moment of confused staring before the Cavalier suddenly pulled his horse away from the wagon and rode off at a full gallop.

Ash grits his teeth. "That was definitely a scout." He then brings his airman rifle to bear and fire at the scout, missing his mark by about five miles and two days. His left arm aim is literally shit.

"Well, I had my hopes." Ash sighs and awkward reaches his left arm over Tiki's head to tap the radio in his right ear. "Ash to squad, they scouted us. We need to get out, now."

"You couldn't stop him?" Nah asks in disbelief.

"Tiki's acting up again."

"Oh."

…

[1st Person Camera]

…

It's been two days and this has happened often enough that Nah isn't even phased by it anymore.

_The first time it happened Nah turned bright red, immediately got the wrong idea, and tried to give the two of us 'some privacy' by trying to hop off of the moving wagon…that she was tied down to._

Anyways, I pull on the reins and get our wagon horses to move as the advance team retreat from the…ok why are there Risen chasing them?

"What the hell did you do?!" I yell into the radio.

"They're really persistent ok!?" Nah yells back, sounding embarrassed. "Mine was the only weapon that worked on them!"

...she's implying that there are Type 3 Risen mixed up in there? "Stop them from chasing us! We need to leave!"

Nah doesn't respond, but instead veer off to the closest patch of trees she can find.

…

[3rd Person Camera]

…

Nah unhooks the vaguely claw like equipment from her belt and wear them on her arms like gauntlets.

She then scans the ground for the biggest tree she can find. Upon seeing her target (one a little over 30 feet tall) She flies down and sinks her mechanical claws into its massive trunk.

With a mighty roar uncharacteristic of her little girl body, Nah uproots the entire thirty feet high tree with her bear hands and holds it up like a massive club.

Unfortunately, the weight of the massive tree made it impossible for her to keep flying without transforming, and thus Nah semi-crash-lands on the ground to intercept the Risen charging towards the retreating friendly units.

Nah, not having the physical size to handle the tree like a weapon, opted instead to spin her entire body while levelling the tree so that it is parallel to the ground. With the momentum granted by her spinning the Entire Fucking Tree™ she slams it into the Risen line and sends them all flying.

Nah then continued to rotate for a few circles, as she couldn't quite arrest the movement (and she was far too nice to just throw the WarTree like a baseball batter after making a hit). After she had finished her spinning, she noticed a Valmese squad of cavaliers charging towards the wagon.

Thus, she did the appropriately ladylike thing and threw the three like a javelin at the cavaliers. Said cavaliers were suitably shocked when a slightly smoking tree impaled itself into the ground in front of them, terrifying their horses and utterly breaking their charge. The cavalier captain then thinks he saw a little girl in a cute red dress zip over their heads and heard what sounded like an apology, and then resolved to never drink again.

…

[1st Person Camera]

…

_Nah has returned to the wagon._

Holy shit.

Holy shit.

"Nah, come here."

She looks at me in confusion, but obliges.

So of course we give her the biggest hug.

_She goes "kya!" with surprise, because I'm not a spontaneous hugger._

I'm all grins. "Holy shit that was INSANE! What was that?!"

Nah, unable to untangle herself from my hug of nerd-induced jubilation, just sputters and squirms a little.

Say'ri watches the two of us with a raised eyebrow. "How did you expect her to answer when she's like that?"

Eventually I let go.

_Eventually._

Super blushy Nah regains her composure after taking quite a few deep breathes. I imagine being with Cynthia would've made her hug-immune, but apparently not.

She takes the claws off of her waist and lays them on the wagon's floor.

_So we pick them up and examine them at length._

I don't think I ever got a good look at these when I first went over Nah's equipment. Judging from the design…these are extenders of some kind?

"These gauntlets are designed to increase my grip area, because…well." Nah explains and opens/closes her hands multiple times for emphasis.

Her hands are tiny and cute.

_They also pack the strength to hurl several tons of destructive wood at the face of those who oppose her._

So basically the gauntlets just let her utilize that strength to greater effect. Nifty. Super nifty. This also means that super me trained Nah (on some level) to pull trees and use them as weapons.

...

_Our joy at finding Nah's talent at woodworking was quickly replaced by the gloomy reality called "we're still being chased."_

So we spent yet another day moving quickly to avoid detection. Y'know, for a reinforcement effort this is a really badly done one…but in any case, we reach a town on the outskirts of what Say'ri informs me is the border of Chon'sin. I see no demarcation lines, so I'll take her word for it.

So why is this village important?

This village is important because we are currently standing in what looks like a (low key) festival of some kind.

_If you're looking for a narrative tone, the tone here should be 'annoyed'._

Yes.

Because standing in front of us and looking very confused, is Robin.

In a flowery purple kimono.

Eating a roasted squid on a stick.

Or whatever the fuck it's called.

I cannot communicate the sheer _ire_ I'm currently feeling at the fact that she seems to be perfectly ok and of sound mind while we had to travel through the cold and snow just to reach them.

_And we had to go uphill both ways._

There was no battle to get to the town (not after our Valmese chasers ended up fighting Risen). We didn't have to sneak, nobody gave two shits about Literally Jesus In a Blanket Tiki or Rebel Warlord Princess Say'ri showing up out of the blue.

And there's just a festival going on for some reason I can't even fathom. It's not-yet-spring in not-quite Japan, what are they celebrating?!

_Robin does look good in the Kimono though._

Yes. Where's everybody else?

_…_

[3rd Person Camera]

…

Robin is supremely confused on why Ash is anywhere near this side of the continent, much less within her direct line of sight.

She stares at him, stares at the spare squid in her other hand, and hesitantly offers it to Ash with a confused "Want one?"

Ash, deeply irritated at the utter lack of dynamic entry, sighs heavily in irritation and takes the squid, as he has no shame and free food is free food.

.

.

.

{ === + === }

Author Notes:

Originally there was a side chapter that I had planned, but I eventually decided that it would make more sense to postpone that particular chapter until I'm done with the primary storyline.

…and yes, Amelia plays a role in that storyline. A non-zero amount of people seem to care for her, which…makes me feel warm and fuzzy, to be honest.

Also, I got Fates (which also contributed to this update being kinda delayed). Respond in a PM if you have an opinion:

The Fates cast felt less engaging than the Awakening cast.

Of the storylines you played, which one did you feel was better written?


	37. Valm Campaign - Endgame 1

{ === + === }

So.

Robin.

_She takes us on a walk._

"What's going on here?" I ask after I get over my utter lack of dynamic entry.

Robin thinks it over a bit. "It's a…fes…actually, it's not really a festival…at least, not in the traditional sense."

I find her pretty purple outfit utterly at odds with the words that just came out of her mouth.

She could see it on my face. "It's closer to a religious ceremony." Robin says. "But everybody gets together and has a little fun while they're at it. Considering the circumstances, I can't really blame them."

She then stumbles because the kimono doesn't give her ample leg room.

…

I see what she meant about it being 'not quite a festival'. There are certainly a lot of people around and there are definitely decorations, but as far as actual festivities go (abundance of food) there doesn't seem to be much going on.

…Hell, it's pretty similar to how it is when I was little, where everyone in the extended family got together, had a good time, and ate like a million bowls of noodles. No massive, brightly colored decorations, just…oh wow. Even that, huh?

_We can see a large door for a house. The walls around the door sport a set of three bright red paper stripes (two as tall as the door and one as wide) with black letters._

There are things written on those papers…the script they're using is different from the ones used by us…and by Valm. Must be a local dialect.

Robin catches me staring at those papers. "They do that for luck, I think." She explains. "I think today's some form of ceremony."

…I do believe I'm getting a little homesick.

_We watch some kids bolt past us wearing fox ears._

…And then things like that happen.

"Oh, that's right. I forgot." Robin…puts on a pair of fox ears like it's the most natural thing in the world. "This one's for you." She holds out another pair for me.

I spend the next twenty seconds trying to make a complete sentence, but all I got out was a very confused "why?"

"It's a part of the ceremony." TIKI of all people…wait.

She has fox ears too. And she's eating a squid.

On one hand: totes adorbs.

On the other: I don't know what's going on.

"Yep. So put this on." Robin wags the spare fox ear at me.

Well. "What kind of ceremony?" I ask Robin while I put the fox ears in place.

_It is far too bright orange for our black hair._

"People dress as foxes to trick the fox god, so they leave the animals alone." Tiki says about the ceremony. "This is quite salty." She adds about her squid.

Funny thing is?

That actually makes logical sense to me. The fox god thing, not the squid thing. I agree about the squid thing though.

"You buy that?" Robin frowns at me while I nod acceptingly at Tiki's explanation.

_So Robin accepted the fox ears despite not caring about the implications?_

"Religious unity is a laughably impossible concept." I shrug. "So I can see things like this continuing to exist." Maybe I shouldn't have said that in the presence of Literally Jesus.

"Makes it easier on me, too." Tiki adds happily. "The less people expect me to have powers I do not, the better. I want another one."

_Tiki has finished her squid with incredible speed. We're still halfway through ours._

She leaves.

"She seems far more energetic than she was." Robin notes as Tiki goes squidhunting. "Was she like this on your way here?"

I wish. "She was pretty listless, except for the times where we needed to fight."

"Interesting." Robin mutters. "You don't know why, right?"

I'm having an incredibly difficult time keeping focused on serious conversation when Robin is Fox. "Not a clue."

Robin sighs. "Damn." She then changes gears. "I'm amazed nobody's paying any attention to her…well, apart from the expected attention."

Tiki is walking around in a blanket, so she's attracting some stares.

"Might be because she let her hair down." Tiki's not wearing her hair in her…ponytail-ish(?) way and she's tucked her hair decoration out of sight. It…it tickles my long hair fancy. Also it makes me wonder what she does for hair care…though do Manaketes need to care in the first place?

"You go for that kind of stuff?" Robin sounds slightly derisive.

"Yeah. What of it?" I sound slightly defensive.

Robin just smirks and doesn't respond.

Also. Did not notice this earlier.

"Flowers?"

_Robin has some small flowers weaved into her hair._

Robin goes slightly red. "It took you this long to notice?" She says lightly.

To be fair. "They blend in with your hair." Both are a bright shade of white. "They're probably cute if I could see them."

"Was that a complement?" Robin laughs. "I got them from a little girl in this village after a Risen attack." She seems to mentally backtrack a little. "Miriel got them, and she gave them to me."

Make sense, if a touch insulting for the kid.

_I can't see Miriel being too handy with flowers._

Which is why it makes sense for her to hand them to someone else.

Let's be tactless. "Out of curiosity, why did Miriel give them to you?"

"I asked." Robin deadpans. "They looked nice."

They're still really hard to see, though. Speaking of things on Robin's head.

_What?_

"Can I see your radio for a second?"

"Huh? Sure." Robin says in confusion…and then realizes that her hands are occupied for the next five seconds (one's holding onto her outfit while we walk, the other a squid).

" 'scuse me."

_Without really waiting for Robin to actually go through the motion of removing her radio from her head, we go in and remove the radio from Robin's ear._

In retrospect I'm not quite sure why I thought this was a socially acceptable idea…or a good one in general.

_Robin freezes because we're literally reaching waaay into her comfort bubble to get the radio._

It comes out easily enough.

Let's focus all of our attention on the radio and pretend to ignore Robin so we look like an idiotic asshole instead of a creepy one.

Uh…

Huh.

…

It's burned out.

How is the radio burned out?

How could it possibly be burned out?

"How often were you using this?" I ask Robin obliviously (or as obliviously as I can manage).

Robin doesn't buy my act for a fraction of a second. "What's wrong with it?" But she plays along anyways.

"Its weight is the same as if it was never filled with spirit dust." I turn the radio over and pop it open.

A wisp of smoke comes rising out of the maintenance port.

_As in: a small hole we use to fill the radio with the spirit water mixture or new spell paper. And by a small hole we mean 'the entire underside of the radio'._

"Is that why my Thorons hit harder for a while?" Robin realizes. "From your tone, I imagine it wasn't supposed to happen."

No…the radio is shielded from contact to avoid burning through the spirit dust too fast…so she broke through the shield somehow?

Hrm.

I wave the radio slightly. "I'll hold on to this, since it's doing you no good like this. And…uh, sorry for plucking it out of your ear like that."

Robin would have made a dignified response, but she tripped again.

…

[3rd Person Camera]

…

Elsewhere…uh. To be honest there's really no good way to transition this smoothly.

The village using crudely made fox-like apparatus as a part of a ritual has been established.

The Shepherds are also in this village.

Thus.

…

Maribelle, upon seeing the person in front of her, could not help but sigh deep and long.

"What do you think?" Vaike grins. "I'm pretty smart, right?"

"That's one way to put it." Maribelle's voice was shakily and held barely hidden disappointment. "What…may I ask…?"

Vaike stands up tall and proud, with his skirt made of twenty faux-fox tails. "They said the strongest foxes grow nine tails, right? Well I got way more tails than that! How do you like me now, fox god?!"

Maribelle had no words, and simply left the man to show himself off to a very confused Cordelia.

Lissa gives Maribelle a soft hug. "If it makes you feel any better, Miriel gave him the idea."

"I did no such thing." Miriel sniffs. "He simply extrapolated from preexisting data, and I must admit, it is admirable."

"That's one way to put it." Laurent sighs. "Don't copy him." He adds as a warning to Cynthia.

Cynthia looks disappointed. "Eeh? Why not?"

She's also holding onto a clump of faux fox tails.

Severa's minding her friend. "Just…don't. Also, hand those over."

"No." Cynthia moves to hide her tails, and the two get into a minor tussle.

Sumia watches Cynthia and Severa fight it out for a bit. "Chrom. The temple is about three day's walk north of here."

Chrom takes his eyes off of his future daughter yelling about 'Love all foxes' with a despairing shake of his head. "Right. We'll head out tomorrow; how's Valm's movement?"

"Sluggish." Gaius replies. "The local commander's got a good head and is not a friend of Valm. He'll take any reason to avoid giving them help so long as it makes sense." He grins and gives a thumbs up. "The troops here are locals, too. We won't have any problems with pursuers for a while, Blue."

Chrom then glanced around, a little more furtively than usual. "Anything about the information Tiki gave us?"

Gaius shook his head slightly. "Nothing so far…whatever 'darkness' our cute little goddess was talking about isn't the type to show off."

"What about Tharja?" Fredrick suggests, earning him a sharp glare from Chrom.

"She's got eyes only for Bubbles." Gaius grins. "Besides, from what our goddess is implying, the threat is recent, not from someone who's had two years to make a move and didn't."

Fredrick seems to ignore that last bit. "What about Robin herself?" He goes down his checklist, ignoring Chrom's increasingly annoyed expression.

"Same problem." Gaius shrugs. "If anything else Bubbles had the best chance of killing you, Blue."

Chrom nods readily. "Robin has been a steadfast ally since she first joined." He says firmly.

"'Do not doubt her.' " Fredrick steals Chrom's thunder. "And what of Ash?"

"He qualifies as a bad guy?" Gaius chuckles, then thinks on it while Chrom smolders some more. "I don't believe Techie's out to get us. If he was, we'd be dead already."

"It could be some element that Ash is unaware of." Miriel offers as a theory and make the boys jump in surprise. "His unnatural weakness to dark magic is still a factor." She then glares sharply at Chrom. "Your highness, I would advise that we stop pursuing this line of thought any further."

_Lest we accidentally spill something, huh… _Chrom sighs. "Right, sorry."

Virion chips in. "Even if Ash was merely an ally merchant, the fact remains that he's paying for the entirety of this war out of pocket."

Everyone listening in let that sink in for a minute.

"So even if he was an enemy, we can't move until we're at least back in Ylisse." Fredrick summarizes to Chrom's increasing annoyance. "And if that were to happen, then this evil would've already done its job." A glint comes into his eyes. "How fortunate that he showed up now, of all times."

Fredrick then suffered an unfortunate thrown frying pan attack to the back of his head.

_It did no damage._

"Don't make trouble for Chrom." Cordelia snaps. "And stop suspecting our allies."

"Sorry dear." Fredrick mutters at the ground as Cordelia politely apologizes to the previous owner of the pan (Anna).

…

[1st Person Camera]

…

We're doing a bit of walking around. Robin's getting progressively annoyed at tripping over nothing due to her outfit, and I'm getting progressively cheerier with every little trip she does. I don't know why but seeing her going through minor inconveniences brings me great joy.

_Taking joy in the suffering of your close ones is the sign of true friendship._

Tiki also rejoined us after getting more squid. Not too sure on how or why she's so energetic in this village, and I'm pretty sure she doesn't know either. It might be the squid?

_Maybe it was a salt deficiency she's finally getting the cure for._

She hangs out around us. That can't possibly be the case.

…Jokes aside, we're not short on salt, even though the FE production of salt is haphazard.

...

Um.

Point of the matter is: Tiki is happy.

She also has a penchant for latching onto arms.

Robin is currently Sumia-lite.

We're the nearest object of relative stability.

…

"This is a little embarrassing." Robin mutters. "I think people are staring."

"I think they would be staring regardless of what's currently going on." Tiki replies nonchalantly.

"What's that supposed to mean?" Robin grumbles. "Do we look that weird?"

YES. YES WE DO.

_Shouting?_

I'M EXTREMELY UNCOMFORTABLE RIGHT NOW

AND TURNED ON

BUT MOSTLY UNCOMFORTABLE

_Sheesh._

_Yes, he's walking with Robin on his left arm and Tiki on his right._

I'M VERY HAPPY AND ALSO VERY WORRIED

BECAUSE LUCK ALWAYS EQUALS OUT AT ZERO

ALWAYS

NEVER NOT ZERO

FUCK

HELP

_"Is he alright?" Tiki asks upon seeing us steadfastly staring forward and nowhere else._

_"He's fine…probably." Robin waves a hand over our face. "We might be a little too much for him."_

_"Really?" Tiki pokes our cheek. "I thought he was a touch more worldly than that."_

_"Uh…" Robin goes a little red. "To be honest, I thought so too."_

WHAT

_"Hmm…?" Tiki has an innocently curious look on her face. "Is it me, or is he redder than before?" _

_Robin carefully observes us as well. "Oh, you're right."_

_The two trade a devious glance, and then—_

NOPE

TOO MUCH

…

…

…

Uh.

So I'm suddenly sitting down.

"Oh, looks like you're awake." Robin happily says somewhere out of my vision range. "How's your head?"

"Pounding like crazy." I groan. "Where are we?"

"We're sitting." Tiki says cheerfully from outside my vision range as well. "Did you walk this far without noticing?"

…Uh…apparently I did? I went from A to B without realizing I did anything.

"Please don't do that again. Not for a while, at least." I get up.

"Did it bother you that much?" Robin laughs. "Good lord, you're innocent."

Um. "You're both extremely pretty, so yeah, it bothers me."

Robin giggles. "Usually, those two sentiments don't flow together."

My face is still very hot from when the two. Uh.

_For god's sake. They gave us a simultaneous peck on both cheeks._

It was evil.

_Ahem._

…alright, fine. Fucking hell that was nice of them, even if they were just teasing.

…

After I've recovered (which took like a minute) we went on our merry way to pray at the local temple to Naga. It's a bit weird to see Jesus praying to Jesus, but hey, whatever works.

_Technically…_

Technically Tiki isn't Naga, yeah. It just sounded better that way.

As we were on our way back though…

"Oy." Robin suddenly said sharply. "Over there."

I follow her gaze to see…a pretty girl with golden hair.

…What of it?

"Oh, right. You're not Virion." Robin says with a mischievous grin and a playful wink. "Doesn't she remind you of someone you knew?"

I have a pretty small social circle, so the only person I knew would be that would satisfy the physical categories (that Robin is also aware of) would be…

…Holy shit. "You really think so?" I say rather doubtfully, if a little hopefully.

"Old love?" Tiki asks.

"Hardly." I smile… "Well, maybe not. Point is, why the fuck is she in Valm?"

_Robin twitches a little when we verbally backpedaled._

"Should we talk to her?" Robin wonders. "By the looks of things, she's Valmese nobility, so she might end up alerting us to the garrison."

Huh. "Didn't you say they wouldn't raise a finger?"

"Looking the other way is a lot easier when no one makes a noise." Tiki says dutifully. "If she is your friend, then simply talking should suffice."

Tiki then puts a hand over her waist, and smiles at us.

…

So basically Hot Sexy Literally Dragon Jesus just issued a nonverbal threat.

Against the entire goddamn village.

Cool.

…

Let's see…current time is…dusk. The sun's starting to go down and the people are dispersing back home. If this 'festival' is similar to what we had back home, this is where the two hour long dinners start.

So…how do I approach her? I don't actually know if it's Amelia, though I trust Robin's judgment. I also don't know what kind of social ranking she has, and if anyone realizes that I'm affiliated with Ylisse I'll get her killed.

Especially with Tiki here, since it's now common knowledge that she's no longer in the Mila Tree.

"Tiki."

_She glances at us._

"Sorry to ask this, but can you go back?"

She tilts her head quizzically for a second. "You're worried about politics?"

I nod. "Sorry."

She bows slightly. "I understand. May your conversation go smoothly." She then winks a little uncharacteristically. "If it doesn't, let me know."

_She also pats the pouch containing her Dragonstone._

I do not understand how her personality swings so hard.

"Should I leave too?" Robin asks. "So you and your ex can get back together?"

…I'm not into conducting NTR. "Nah, stay. I want your opinion and input."

…that made her happy. Huh.

_You've read enough to know what that possibly means, right?_

…Yeah. A touch worried now. Well, not really worried worried, since if Robin actually likes us that'll be pretty nice, but…

Focus.

We stop a random man on the street. "Hey, who's the lady with the retainers around her?" I gesture to Probably!Amelia.

"Oh, that's the Countess." The man replies with quite a bit of disdain. "You're no local, are ya?"

Hm. Given his mood it might be a good idea to avoid pushing further.

"I'm terrible at remembering faces." I grin sheepishly…because it's true. "Thank you." And just to hedge my bets. "It's a holiday today, right? Have a good evening."

The man feels the weight of the bag of gold I gave him and his eyes widen. "Thank you, stranger." He cracks a wry smile. "Don't be out too late with your girl now, alright?"

…

So I know she's a countess, but not her name.

Fuck.

"Time to do it the old fashioned way." Robin grins…and then touches up her hair.

I'm gonna say this out loud, but that did very little to change Robin's image.

_"Stop staring. You're making me self-conscious." Robin grumbles, she then catches us struggling to avoid grinning. Her subsequent withering glare made us feel bad._

The two of us approach the lady by simply walking over to her with the intention to talk.

Predictably, her retainers (two Heroes, two Troubadours (lol)) move to block our way.

"I would just like to talk, thank you." I say courteously.

I'm also packing my pocket spellbook, and I'm sure Robin is as well…though getting into a fight is bad.

The lady turns to look at us, and…bows politely.

"Ash, Robin, I bid you both good evening." She says formally, and then addresses her retainers. "Stand down."

_They do._

"Countess Amelia." Robin bows gracefully. "It's been far too long since we last spoke."

I wave. "Yo. How's it hanging?"

_Note that we are the equivalent to the CEO of a major company._

Robin glares at us. "Why is your diplomatic sense all over the place?"

"My diplomatic sense is tied directly with how much money I'm expected to spend." I say confidently. "So, Amelia, how are you in Valm?"

"And more importantly what kind of deal would result in this kind of marriage?" Robin adds.

_Amelia looks troubled for a second._

"While I'd like to have a talk, it would be best to wait until my husband returns." She says politely.

Huh.

Robin frowns. "Really? Why's that?"

Amelia scratches her face. "Weeell…"

_We hear the sound of someone running very quickly before seeing someone dash down the street towards us._

Uh…huh. What's that sound?

"OHMYDARLINGWIFEWHEREHAVEYOUBEENIHAVEBEENWORRIEDthatsomescoundrelorsomesuchwouldvemadeoffwithyouifthatweretohappenmylifewouldbeforfeitandthejoyousdayswiththeradianceofmylifewouldbequashedarethesethebrigandswhowouldHOPETOACCOSTYOUCALLTHEGUARDSISHALLNOTHAVEHERTAKENBYTHELIKESOFYOOOOOOOU!"

_The end of that statement was accompanied by an accusing (and quivering) finger pointed in our direction, complete with angry/tired heaving._

…

Uh.

…

I have no idea what just came out of his mouth. Robin has no idea what just came out of his mouth. The retainers have no idea what came out of his mouth, but they seem to have a good idea of what's going on through sheer experience.

Amelia bops her hubby on the head. "Dear, these are old friends of mine. Please do not trouble them."

The…guy. Who does he remind me of? He looks really familiar, though his mannerisms leave much to be appreciated.

_He's blond like Amelia, but his hair is much curlier and not nearly as awesome. He's pretty good looking otherwise._

He did seem to calm down though. "My apologies." He then takes a deeeeep breath.

"Let's avoid talking while standing out here." Robin offers. "It's getting cold."

…

_So we duck into a tavern._

A tavern with a small amount of foot traffic. We paid for a private room (out of my wallet again).

…

Ah! Now I remember.

He reminds me of that blonde dude from Zero's Familiar. The moron with the rose, but older.

_Guiche, for those who are familiar with the work. Blond teenager Virion, for those who are not._

…

[Exposition]

…

Hmm.

So.

Amelia's parents…more or less sold her off as political capital to Valm for the sake of Ylisse…without informing Ylisstol. Her parents were realists (and I say that as politely as I can manage) and they believed Valm's annexation of Ylisse to be guaranteed, with the only differing factor being how quickly it would happen.

Credit where it's due, they sought a political alliance with Valm to save themselves and their town…and to end the inevitable war quicker by being the thorn in Ylisse's side.

"Smart." Robin had commented with a soft elbow to my ribs. "If only you weren't there, huh?"

Yeeah.

So when I visited Amelia's household back then, she was already shipped off. The family didn't want their plan to be discovered before it had a chance to actually fire, so they barred me entry. And then I went and did the thing where I massacred the entire Valmese navy, which was probably not on their list of expected outcomes.

_How did nobody find out afterwards?_

Their family organized an alliance of close friends to corroborate their story, and unlike us (who hung out with the top of the Ylissean and Feroxi governments) lesser noble houses tend to have much smaller intelligence circles, so it's not outside of the bounds of reason for the suspicious folk to hear four or five similar stories and then avoid pursuing further. Hell, that's what I did.

Anyways, the family Amelia married into was an ex-Rosannite household eager to prove their allegiance to Valm…while not being all that eager to be Valmese in the first place. Again, credit where it's due: Amelia's house found the most flexible solution that could help them swing either way. By allying themselves to a newly integrated household, they can claim to be either for or against Valm depending on how the wind blows. Smart. They may not have expected the war to turn as quickly as it did, but still. Smart.

…But I'm still annoyed they cost me my lieutenant. Imagine how much ass she would've kicked as a souped up Falconknight. Gah.

So how does the guy feel about all of this?

_To be fair for the guy: he's excitable, but is otherwise a pretty grounded person._

"I understand that our marriage was made on political grounds, and that the situation definitely caused her much hardship." Amelia's husband had said seriously. "However, I had, have, and will never waver from my intention to make her happy, regardless of what has happened…and what might happen in the future."

Concerning the guy's household:

Prior to our invasion, the man's daddy misread the situation and led an armed rebellion that was very quickly and decisively crushed. Walhart then executed just the ringleaders of the rebellion and allowed the rank-and-file soldiers to return to their homes with what amounted to a light slap on the wrist.

This meant that a. Walhart solidified his situation as a legitimate and fair (if somewhat harsh) ruler among the populace, and b. This dude is now the titled Count and the new governor of these fair lands. Bonus points? With his father's reputation in front of him, he doesn't have much of a choice but to sit and wag his tail whenever Valm makes a noise.

So what do they contribute to the war effort?

"We handle the supply and logistics for Valm around this area." Amelia explains. "However, with the current situation in Steiger City, I'm not sure what they intend for us to do next."

Steiger City's experiencing some pretty serious riots, and fires seem to be commonplace. I think the city's in danger of being burned to the ground by rioters. Pretty amazing that the city's situation spiraled out of control as fast as it did after I bombed their granaries to the ground.

For the record, we're keeping our Shepherd affiliations under wraps. The man knows about Amelia's background (a little hard to hide her selling point) but he's sharp enough to keep his mouth shut about it.

…But if we're claiming to be old friends of hers, then the fact that we are technically enemies is a bit of an open secret. Eh.

_Sure, just shrug off a security risk._

Uh…where was I. Right. Active combat role.

Amelia is currently no longer flying as an active combatant.

"Valm has a tendency to send its strongest soldiers in the most dangerous missions." Her hubby explained. "So we're keeping our best troops home."

_You still don't know his name?_

I'm being petty, now shush.

"I think it's making me fat." Amelia laughs. "Not being allowed to fly again."

Makes sense…they need some kind of excuse to keep her from the front lines.

Robin squints. "I don't see it."

Her poor husband then goes: "She is getting a little-"

And that's as far as he went before Amelia gently laid a hand on his leg, causing him to freeze in shock and terror.

"I'm still having a hard time accepting that you're suddenly in Valm." I say for like the fifth time.

"And I'm having a hard time believing you used to be a Shepherd." The husband laughs. "You certainly don't look the part."

Asshat.

_We can tell he's joking though._

"Nobody looks the part in the Shepherds, except maybe the bodyguard." Robin sighs. "It's a constant struggle."

The man laughs it up…and then makes a signal to one of the Heroes, who moves to close and block the door (via leaning on it with his arms crossed like a badass). "Alright, I believe we can get down to business." He says seriously. "And I do apologize for alarming you." He adds quickly.

Robin had a hand on her Thoron tome and was inches away from causing a horribly toasty accident.

To my credit, I did raise an arm to stop her. "No widowmaking."

_If Robin wanted to use a Thoron our arm would not have been enough to stop her._

It's the thought that counts.

Robin doesn't respond but simply glares at the man.

"The only ones in attendance now are my trusted retainers, and yourselves." The man explains. "I'm sorry, but I believed that acting in good faith was necessary to throw off the trackers."

…so we _were _being watched. I wondered why my sensors were acting up.

_Sensors._

"Paranoia" doesn't sound nearly as emotionally well-adjusted.

"Please warn us next time." Robin tucks her Thoron back into her clothes.

"Again, my apologies." The man says sincerely. "Now, as I am plenty aware, we are currently at war. I have no desire to participate in this war…and certainly no desire to strike at the friends of my beloved wife."

"Ain't that nice." I…may sound a little less than sincere.

The man chuckles. "I am aware that the two sitting in front of me are the Grandmaster Tactician of the Shepherds…and the Lord of the Coasts himself."

_The retainers in attendance stirred at our title._

"Nice to meet you." I frown. "I think?"

He laughs. "We all know you are responsible for many of the stories surrounding the stories of demons from the sky." He then stares at us. "I would like to ask of you…henceforth, what do you plan to do?"

I assume he means about the war. "Given that we have vapor zombies falling onto our heads, ending this war is what I plan to do."

"Vapor zombies?" The man repeats with a raised eyebrow. "Ah, the Risen…and how do you plan to do that?"

Hm. "Classified. Sorry." I shrug. "State secret and all that."

_Amelia's hubby looks confused._

"And I expect that you will petition us for assistance against the Risen when the war ends?" He says after he gets un-confused. Status effects are annoying.

I nod. "And unless you plan to let the Risen overrun you eventually, you'll accept it, too."

_Everyone in attendance stare at us._

My diplomatic skill is bad. This is no longer news.

"And this is why he doesn't negotiate unless there's a lot of money involved." Robin mutters into her hands.

"From what I've heard, you're immensely powerful already." He frowns. "What could you possibly need from us?"

Gee I wonder. "Air power."

_He is now a lot less friendly. It might be because we just implicitly asked his wife to die for him._

"…Really now?" He says with just the tiniest threatening intention, and I hear one of the Heroes move behind us.

"This is now your problem." Robin grumbles…what the hell Robin I thought you liked me

_She abandons the table we're sitting at and takes her place against a wall._

Robin you asshole come back here and suffer with me.

_We glare at her, and she shrugs._

…Fuck it. Tap the pocket spellbook, snap fingers.

The Hero behind us crumple to the ground, gagging.

"Yes, really." I smile slightly. "I find your lack of faith disturbing."

_Um._

I have a spell that specifically target organs and body parts. For example, I can specifically target the throat.

_Snap fingers again, and the Hero takes large gulps of air while still on the ground. Everyone else is now suitably cautious and alarmed._

"What will you do if we do not assist?" Amelia's hubby asks suspiciously. "Threaten us until we comply?"

"I plan to do nothing." I shrug. "Again, our end goal is the Risen. The less damage we do to each other, the better."

…

…

[Much Later, Like "almost midnight" later]

…

…

"That went well." Robin yawns. "What did you think about the guy?"

My answer is a noncommittal "Eh."

"Did you really not have feelings for her?" Robin teases. "With a response like that, it makes me wonder."

I shrug. "Well…I mean I do like her, just not with romantic intent. We had…what, one time where we went and did something?" It's been years now.

"And yet you make a point to avoid remembering her husband's name." Robin says in mild disbelief.

My eyebrows go up. "I'm petty. Do _you_ remember what his name was?"

"Of course not." Wow is she blasé about this. "He's not that important to me."

…

Wow.

I can't help but ask. "So what was important to you?"

"Amelia." Robin…really? "She was disingenuous about her combat record."

…Really.

"Uh-huh." Robin nods upon seeing my face. "I couldn't see any numbers, but I'm sure she learned a few things since…well, the fact that she apparently learned Aegis and Sol are not ordinary. I guess I can't really say if she's an active participant in this war just based on that."

Right.

"She also has a kid." Robin adds offhandedly.

…

Ok, first off: a little creepy that Robin can learn stuff like that from her cheating heads up display.

Second: awww~ "Boy or girl?"

"No clue." Robin looks blank. "I can only tell the name."

Fair enough. "So what's the kid's name?"

"Tenia."

That sounds like a girl's name. Also, Robin has started shivering. It's getting a bit nippy out, but I don't think tha…oh. Or it could be.

_Robin just gave a cute anime "akchu!" sneeze. Some of the flowers came out of her hair, too._

Hang on. I have a massive coat I can use.

"Thanks." Robin smiles and wears my magically warm coat like a capeblanket. "Do you think we'll end this war before summer hits?"

We better. "Worst case scenario? We should. Valm doesn't know about that temple place, right?"

"Yeah." Robin nods. "We'll pay the place a visit and then swing north into Valm's capital per our plan…what did you want with Pheros?"

The plan, as she said, is pretty much a modified version of the endgame chapters for the Valm arc, with the mirror paralogue thrown in beforehand. Robin can't talk about it out loud obviously, but the goal is to use the rougher and less guarded coastline around Valm's front gate to sneak by and then conduct an alpha strike on Walhart. We either kill him or subdue him, but either way if the country is being held by his charisma, then taking him out will cause it to collapse.

…Again, no words on what we plan to do about the power vacuum afterwards, but…

Concerning Pheros, though… "I plan to dangle her in front of Walhart to get him to get him to consider a peace treaty."

Robin frowns. "I hope you don't mean that literally."

I smile. "Of course not. Pheros has a thing for Walhart, so at least she should be receptive to negotiations if we want to do things the nonlethal way."

Robin shakes her head in…something. Not quite despair, but close. "I can't believe you made me modify a combat plan just to save the potential girlfriend of the enemy emperor."

"You had no problems with it, right?" My smile gets wider. "I mean, it was a plan made and carried out by you, after all."

"Flattery gets you nowhere." Robin huffs…but she's blushy, so ha.

_We're very petty._

_Also, it's cold out, so the two of us are cuddlewalking while heading back to the Shepherd's quarters._

After we've been walking for…five minutes? We went a long way during the day, it seems.

"Ash?" Robin asks softly.

"Hmm?"

"I've been thinking about what Tiki said."

About the whole 'Darkness approaches you' thing? "Yeah? Are you worried?"

I feel her nodding. "Yeah…all signs are pointing for me being the betraying party here." She then sighs. "I've told Chrom about my worries, but he doesn't seem to treat it seriously."

I wasn't there for that conversation, but "He told you he'll save you if you turn against us, right?"

_We give her a light squeeze._

"That's the problem. I don't know if something like that is possible."

She sounds really scared. Also, I'm not liking where this conversation is going.

"You want me to do what Chrom can't, then?" Ick.

She laughs a little. "You don't sound enthusiastic."

"How can I be?" I chuckle. "Rest assured, if you do end up turning, we'll spare no expense in bringing you back."

"You too, huh?" She mimes a gagging noise. "All of you are softies."

I grin. "Well, to be fair, if you do end up turning without any hope of recovery, then I'll take more drastic measures."

"I shudder to think what your drastic measures might be." She giggles.

I give her another squeeze. "Rope. Lots of rope…maybe some belts."

"I'm now a little worried." Robin laughs. "But it's nice to know you're prepared."

…

I've thought about what it would be like if Robin actually switched sides, and I've thought about what kind of countermeasure we would take if something like that were to happen. Frankly, it's not pretty.

_So what counterplan do we have in play?_

We…really don't. If she flips and it turns into a fight, then yeah, we might end up taking her out as a heat of the moment thing. Otherwise…we pray?

There's also the alternative of 'what happens if we're the traitor', but I'm pretty sure if I end up flipping I'll do the whole berserking thing, and since all of my equipment and special spells is based around being calm and logical about everything…I'm pretty sure Berserk!Ash will be easier to take down than Normal!Ash.

Of course there's the scenario where some random enemy becomes the big bad evil guy…but if that happens we just pop him between the eyes and call it a day, so eh.

_We have a very fluid definition of morality, it seems._

No morals here. It's just easier to kill someone you don't know.

…

"You're shaking too, I see." Robin observes.

I…"Yeah. It's not a subject matter I like very much."

_We've arrived at the Shepherd's lodging._

We're staying here too.

"You and me both." Robin agrees. "Thanks for the walk; good night."

Good…

_She bounces into the inn before I can get a word in._

…Well…

Now what?

.

.

.

{ === + === }

Author Notes:

For the record: the current plot progression has not derailed in favor of shipping fuel.

_But it's worrying you enough that you wrote a disclaimer about it._


	38. Valm Campaign - Endgame 2

{ === + === }

We had to delay our trip to the shrine by an extra two days due to snow. While it's good to know that the snow also stops Valm's ground force from eventually finding us, seeing the occasional Griffon and Wyvern Knight zipping above the town doesn't exactly keep us from getting jumpy.

I don't have any more news regarding Steiger City. I hope Nino's alright.

Also, I'm apparently dying?

…

[Steiger City, 3rd Person Camera]

…

For the past two days, Nino, Owain, and Inigo carefully hid in the city spiraling out of control. Through their wonderous powers of sword-to-face, they were both able to keep themselves and a small portion of the city safe. As a side effect, Nino (by virtue of being easily the most sane of the trio) became the figurehead of the small militia group that rose around their efforts.

Of course, with the city both lacking in food and lacking in logistical support due to, y'know, it BEING the primary logistical provider, the nose dive of public order resulted in savage infighting with massive civilian casualties.

"This doesn't seem to be getting any better." Inigo says in disgust. "We should consider getting out of here."

"Good thing it's cold out." Owain mutters. "Or the smell itself will kill us."

"What would be the safest path out of here, then?" Nino asks.

Inigo scratches his head. "The south gate is the furthest from us, but it should be the least well defended. We'll have to slog through the snow to get there though."

Nino glances at the hodgepodge of people (mostly poorer families of the city) gathered with them in their hideout Inn. "Can we make it without taking casualties?"

"Well…" Inigo scratches his head. "The streets seemed to have quieted down a bit, but it will be tough going."

"Where do we go when we leave?" Owain asks. "I don't believe the Valmese army will just let us ride into the sunset and voice no complaint."

"The strongest garrison is located at the east gate, along with a Paladin detachment." Ingio nods. "To believe they will allow us to leave through the south and circle around without interfering is a bit much."

"What about the west?" Nino asks.

"Last I checked they were busy with the Risen." Inigo replies. "If they're capable of intercepting us, I'll be very surprised."

Nino nods. "Ok." She then turns to address the crowd. "Everyone! We'll be leaving Steiger tonight. Please make sure you have what you need with you; it's cold out there."

"And make sure your faces are covered." Inigo adds. "Wouldn't do to get sick because of the road, now would it?"

He got a few nervous laughs.

…

A few minutes later, the group leaves the Inn under the cover of the night and slowly makes their way parallel to the main street towards the south gate.

"This makes me sick." Inigo mutters while staring steadfastly forward. "Of all the scenarios I imagined our past to be, this wasn't one of them."

"Boss caused this." Owain notes and gently nudges some corpses to the side of their path. "Our wondrous leader caused this…right?"

"I'm no fool, Owain." Inigo snaps (making sure to keep himself quiet, because they're all jumpy as hell.) "I wouldn't blame the Boss for actions taken several steps removed from what he has done."

Owain can read his friend well enough. "…but?"

"…But it's very difficult to feel sympathy for the rest of humanity when we act like this." Inigo sighs.

Owain grins evilly. "To allay your concerns, I'd like to point out that we haven't been clean from the fighting either."

Inigo rolls his eyes. "How's that supposed to make me feel better?"

Nino, leading the line, suddenly raises her arm.

Owain and Inigo both draw their swords. Some of the peasants behind them grip their spears tighter.

"Cover's done, eh?" Inigo remarks upon seeing their desired path blocked by rubble. "Where do we go from here?" He looks to Nino as the girl peeks out cautiously.

She sighs. "We'll have to cross into the main street from here." She squints against the light provided by the selectively burning houses along the road. "It doesn't look like we have anybody to worry about."

The end of her sentence was punctuated by one of the burning houses collapsing.

"It'll take a miracle to bring the city back to working order." Inigo mutters grimly.

"It took a miracle to bring this city to its knees in the first place." Owain chips in. "If we want to move, we better do it now."

Nino nods. "Yeah; Inigo, please take the lead."

"You can count on me." Inigo grins.

…

With Inigo leading (and Owain bringing up the rear) the column of roughly twenty people advanced quickly through the ice-covered main street.

"Bandits to our left." Inigo warns and attaches a small gem to his sword.

The bandits in question (two Mercenaries and a Brigand) realize that their hiding spot is compromised and charge out to meet the young man at the lead of the column.

One of the Mercenaries takes a ball of wind to his chest and goes down.

The other reaches Inigo and attempts to decapitate the young man with a swing of his sword. Ingio ducks underneath the swing and runs the Mercenary through.

The Brigand, understandably cowed by the past few seconds, slowed down in his mad charge towards Inigo long enough for one of the civilians to put an arrow into the man's chest. Unlike his two buddies, he survived and decided to run very quickly in the opposite direction.

"Didn't even need this, did I?" Inigo pops the gem out of his sword. "Well, no harm done being careful."

The group keeps going, occasionally fighting small groups of ballsy (if stupid) rioters, until they finally reach the south gate.

"Oh…boy. That does not bode well." Inigo remarks with a small laugh.

"That wasn't here this afternoon." Owain adds.

Nino frowns at the ominously draconic shaped Risen Manakete as it savaged what's left of the stone gatehouse. "That thing is…really powerful, right?"

"A Risen Manakete's strength is tied to its ability to retain its physical shape." Inigo nods. "So by the looks of it, that thing over there should be on par with a normal dragon…if not stronger due to its incorporeal form."

The Dragon's pretty much an armored, three-story house of anger and mindless violence, as it kindly demonstrates by flattening another house.

"Can we defeat it?" Nino felt herself shiver, though she couldn't tell why.

Owain shakes his head. "It's impossible without Yarne or Nah." He drew his pair of swords and connected each one to a pair of pouches on his bed. "But we can slow it down."

"Don't get in over your head." Inigo warns.

It took Nino a few seconds to get the implication. "We're just going to let him fight it?" She says in shock.

Inigo nods. "Owain can keep something like that busy for five minutes. We'll need to get away before then."

Nino wasn't convinced. "But…"

"We used to do this all the time." Inigo reassures her (badly). "Owain's a bit of a fluff, but he knows his trade."

"I can still hear you." Owain rolls his eyes, having not moved yet.

"I know." Inigo grins. "Don't get careless out there, alright? Cynthie isn't here to bail you out if you mess up." He then catches the anger on Nino's face. "I know what you're thinking…Owain is going to be fine. He'll do his part, and we'll do ours."

For emphasis, Inigo tilts his head to the civilians under their protection. "And we have quite the work ahead of us."

Nino relents but is obviously unhappy about the whole thing.

Owain doesn't seem to notice. "Alright." He takes a calming breath and then bolts towards the Risen Dragon.

Up to this point the Dragon had occupied itself with the reasonably innocent task (for, y'know, a vapor zombie) of crushing houses and sections of the massive city wall. As it was about to strike at the foundation of another wall section, it found itself rudely interrupted by a small dude in a bright yellow coat yelling at the top of his lungs. Turning away from the remains of the guard tower it used to trim its claws, the dragon focused its attention on the newcomer.

The Dragon then received a bolt of orange colored energy of some kind to the face. It itched.

"I am Owain, the Sword that smites evil." Owain declares to the dragon. "Upon my sword, you shall fall today!"

"Who's that idiot?" One of the surviving men in the ravaged guard tower had the balls to ask before the Risen Dragon accidentally turned him into a smear on the wall.

The Dragon, now entirely focused on the new threat, launched itself bodily towards Owain.

"Thank Naga for no breath attacks." Owain mutters as he zips away from the Dragon's path of…falling? I guess? The Dragon, not having the senses as befitting a live creature, dove straight into the ground and made a crater in the rock paved main path.

Seizing the opportunity, Owain dashes towards the Risen Dragon and delivers two strikes into the Dragon's flank, before pulling back out as the Dragon's tail attempted to behead him as a counterattack. The tail missed, struck a row of houses, and detached from the dragon's backside.

"Guess we're lucky." Inigo mutters as he leads the civilians carefully around the combat area. The Dragon, focused on killing Owain, didn't notice.

Owain, for his part, wasn't too interested in snarking, and instead concentrated his efforts on dodging a second reckless charge from the Dragon, letting it ram into and through a row of houses. He then realized that letting the Dragon tear into the city was probably not the best of ideas.

Fortunately, the Risen Dragon's cognitive functions only told it to kill the funny little man in yellow, and it willingly charged at Owain even as said young man bolted out of the crumbled gate.

"I did that. Now what?" Owain couldn't help but ask as the Dragon (having torn through a section of the city wall) homes in on him again. "Now I make history, I suppose." He grins despite the Dragon's roar, and activates the gems slotted into his swords. "Roar! Excalibur! Arondight! Dance with the—"

He then had to duck under the Dragon's claw trying to swipe his head off.

"You should learn to respect style, fiend!" Owain yells, more angry that his speech was interrupted than having his head nearly torn off. "And I shall be the deliverer that corrects this injustice!"

The Dragon just yells at him and tries to behead him again.

"Pah." Owain flattens himself to the ground. "At least let me pose, dammit."

He then notices the edges of his swords glow with a faint orange hue and takes that as the cue to propel himself upwards and forwards towards the Dragon.

The Dragon, having next to no sense of self-defense, simply stood there as Owain cut into its leg and separated the appendage from its vapor-like, draconic body.

Owain himself didn't seem too pleased about his success, and instead sprinted away from the Dragon as quickly as he could. Unfortunately, he could not outrun the Dragon's massive wings and opted to hide behind a large rock to avoid being blown into the sky.

Owain then cursed himself for taking his eyes off of the Dragon, and bolted away from the large rock. Said large rock was then demolished by the Dragon running straight into it.

Owain _then_ took one look at the Dragon unfurling its wings again and sighs. "This is so much harder than I thought it would be." He mutters and drives his sword into the ground right as the Dragon brings its wings crashing down to the earth.

A gale of wind struck Owain, who avoided being blown back god knows how far via stabbing one of his swords into the ground. Unfortunately, his sword-anchor did not make him immune to the effects of heavy wind, and Owain was winded as a result.

With its target stunned due to the wind, the Dragon makes one more dive towards Owain. It could not comprehend (nor care about) why one of the little yellow man's sticks was suddenly pointed in its direction.

"Roar! Arondight!" Owain yells (unnecessarily). The sword he extended towards the incoming Dragon then split, revealing a small set of rails in the middle.

The Dragon, perhaps feeling a little bit challenged by Owain's yell, decided to do its own roar and opened its mouth.

Owain then put a bullet into the Dragon's throat before unsticking his non-shooty sword from the ground. He then swiftly rolled away from the line of fire belonging to the Dragon that did not care about being shot in the mouth. Though said Dragon did not breathe fire, it did tear into the ground with its massive body and created a gash as if the earth was struck by a meteor.

"I've never been happier to simply buy time." Owain sighs and reloads his Arondight with another nail. He then levels his Excalibur at the Dragon. "Fiend! For the next three minutes, you shall be my plaything!"

The Dragon, being unable to comprehend odd and out of place cultural references, simply roared at Owain and again barreled towards the young man.

…

[Elsewhere, 1st Person Camera]

…

So. We leave the not-quite-festival town on the morning of our third day of stay.

Though Sumia estimated that it would take us three days, our entire trip took five on account of the Goddamn Snow™ being everywhere and bogging everything down.

_Miriel filled us in on the whole 'we're gonna die' thing during the trip, as we had preciously little else to do._

More worryingly, Lissa caught a cold that apparently wasn't going away despite Maribelle spamming an entire restore staff on her. We (Laurent, myself) came to the conclusion that it must be a local virulent strain or something of that general description.

Either way, we bundled Lissa up nice and tight with our warm heated cloak so hopefully she'll get better before we have to engage Valm for good. Fortunately the cold doesn't look and feel dangerous, since Lissa's just mad that we're fussing over her so much (and the worst symptom she gets is a medium fever).

What else? During the entire trip we kept seeing (probably the same) Griffon Knights circling high overhead. While it didn't seem as if the air units were actively hunting us down, it meant that for safety's sake Robin, Miriel, and Tharja had to take turns maintaining a Screen Cover over our heads to minimize the odds of detection.

_Hawk and Laurent were kept on reserve for combat duty and Henry didn't want to do it._

So they're all pretty tired by the end of the trip.

To add to that, Risen kept popping up in small numbers despite the snow…though I guess this wasn't a big deal, all things considered. Virion covered the left side and I covered the right and the two of us sniped down any Risen that got close enough to mess with us. If any Risen actually survived being shot in the head and closed in enough to be a threat, Vaike would just pick the vapor zombie up and toss it away behind us.

_Where we would do the right thing and attempt to__ execute it.__ Keyword being attempt._

Going for headshots while on a moving wagon with no suspension is really hard.

…

So, elephant in the room.

According to Miriel and Robin (and after an examination by Tharja and Henry) I should, by all logical reasoning, be incredibly dead right now. According to our resident experts in dark magic, I'm exhibiting so many symptoms of magical corruption that the fact I can use magic (and breathe) at all is a miracle in itself.

_Tharja wouldn't explain exactly what the symptoms were and Henry couldn't place it into words, so we still have no idea what those symptoms are._

We don't have documentation either, so there's really no way to tell…although, to be fair, I feel like that's a good thing. The last I want to worry about while moving onto the Valm campaign endgame is if I'm going to die due to uncontrollable circumstances.

Maybe this is why Robin looked super annoyed with Miriel when we (I) went to confirm with her, like…she knew that it would be a psychological burden and opted not to bring it up.

…

But, back on track. Well, not really on track, but back on…something.

We arrive at the temple place with the sun about to set.

"Finally." Robin voices the thoughts of all of us. "Gaius, Kellam: scout the temple and see if we have any Valm or Risen to deal with."

Gaius made a face. "Really, Bubbles? We just got here."

"It's because we just got here." Robin snaps. "Now get to it."

We're all aware that the three mages on defense have frayed nerves, so Gaius simply shrugs, shakes the snow from his cloak, and then sneaks into the temple.

I assume Kellam went too.

…

Anyways. The temple.

I'm not sure who designed this place, but I get the feeling it used to be something more practical before it became…this thing.

First off, the entrance is half-buried in the ground, like a gate into a crypt. I'm staring at it (and I know people are watching me stare at it) like I'm expecting zombie hordes to just pour out of it and we'll need to make a kill zone or some shit.

Second, there are no trees around the entrance for a fair distance, so we (I) feel rather exposed out here with our wagons out in the open. Granted, there's no enemy air presence, but still.

"The entrance is clear, Bubbles." Gaius calls from somewhere within the temple after a few minutes. "It's big enough to hide all of our gear, too."

I hear multiple people go "Thank Naga for that."

"Move the wagons into the temple." Chrom orders quickly. "Let's get out of this blasted cold already."

"I brought extra firewood." Nah helpfully offers while carrying a battering ram of a tree trunk over her head.

_Double handed, so it looks rather cute, if immensely disconcerting._

Hope the ventilation in the place won't kill us, especially if the rest of the structure is underground.

…

…

Yes, yes it is. Goddammit.

"Bubbles, I don't think there's any army dumb enough to try and lay an ambush in there." Gaius informs us after we squared our wagons away.

_And after Nah tore her tree into neat pieces of firewood and built a fire._

As expected ventilation is nonexistent, but at the same time the entrance that we're occupying is surprisingly huge, so…

"It's dark, you can't see where you're going, and the hallways echo like it's haunted." Gaius chuckles. "The place is hard on the nerves."

"Did you see anything resembling the well they talked about?" Robin asks. I assume 'they' refers to the NPCs that told them this about place.

Gaius shrugs. "I couldn't see my own hands."

"That's a problem." Robin mutters. "Do we have enough torches?"

"Nope." Anna replies happily. "But we can make 'em."

"Great, get to it." Robin yawns. "Gods, I'm tired."

She had the most recent turn in maintaining the cover against aerial detection, so I'm not surprised.

"Wake me up when we're ready to go." Robin says sleepily and outright crashes into one of the wagons.

_Robin specifically chose the wagon that carried __the Shepherd's extra clothing._

So her rest will be warm and slightly itchy.

…

The rest of us…had no real idea what to do next. So we sat and stared at each other for a little bit until Chrom divided us into three teams: one to search for the well, one to search the temple in general, and one to safeguard the entrance and the camp.

_Chrom, Maribelle, and Brady all opted to stay behind._

…which meant none of the expeditionary teams had a healer on team. Joy.

I ended up on a 'look for shiny well' team along with Lon'qu, Olivia, Noire, and Laurent, and we went deeper into the dungeon.

…

First off, I miss videogame lighting. With the torch we have it's literally impossible to see further than ten feet in front of us.

_Current formation: Lon'qu and Olivia are leading, Noire and Laurent are in the center, and we're in the back._

I have a gun and I'm terrified of using it right now because I can't see shit.

Or, amendment: I can see Olivia's glitter. It doesn't reflect light though, so it looks really weird.

…

I'm bored. I'm also terrified, but for the most part I'm bored. The fact that Noire's whispering very quickly to herself is…a little disconcerting? I dunno.

…also she's got a bow in her hand and she hasn't switched yet.

…

"There's an immense amount of magical power here." Laurent suddenly says after ten minutes of almost total silence, making all of us jump. "We must be coming close."

"Oh good." I say, just for the sake of saying something out loud. "I was getting tired."

Judging by the combined glances of Noire and Laurent they're both aware of my imminent death. Boo. I can't even make a joke without people reading into it now.

_No more gallows humor until this thing blows over, apparently._

Booooo.

"It's stuffy down here." Noire non-sequitors, tugging on the collar of her…whatever the hell you call it. Armor/clothes that really accentuate her massive bust size. "Why does the air feel so heavy?"

"It is likely a byproduct of the increased concentration of magic." Laurent says and carefully tucks his spellbooks into a pack at his waist…before pulling out some more spellbooks from inside his cloak.

_He replaced his El-spellbooks with normal spellbooks._

Like dude how many books are you packing?

"Wait." Lon'qu holds up a hand, and we follow his extended sword to see the end of the hallway.

_It turns right._

It's also illuminated by something soft and blue…which is why we can see it turns right.

"Could that be what we're looking for?" Olivia wonders. "Maybe it's a trap."

"Must be a fairly elaborate trap to spring on us after that hallway utterly devoid of light." Laurent mutters. "Stay on guard, everyone."

We carefully approach the lighted corner and turn right.

…

Oh. Wonderful.

There's a shimmering spring. Being guarded by four amorphous blobs of water.

…

The amorphous blobs of water have stopped being amorphous. They are now people.

I don't remember reading this in the travel brochure.

"First time I've seen monsters like this." Lon'qu says, his sword still pointed unflinchingly at the water monsters. "Laurent, do you know of them?"

"I'm afraid this is the first time for me as well." Laurent flips open a Fire book. "Noire."

"R-r-right!"

…Noire isn't going into her Berserker mode?

_Noire readies her bow, but it's obvious she's in her normal state of mind. The fact that she's going "awawawawa" isn't helping matters._

I have to ask. "Noire, you're not flipping?"

Noire just gulps…she can't?

"On guard!" Lon'qu yells as a warning as the wow those things are fast

_Lon'qu dashes forward and engages one of the targets. Said target mutated one of its arms to be a sword. Perhaps predictably, Lon'qu's steels sword clashes with the arm of water as if it too were metal._

"What?!" Lon'qu backs off quickly as the thing takes a swipe at him with its other arm (now sworded). "It's water, for Naga's sake!"

"It's enhanced somehow!" Laurent yells and burns one of the water monsters with fire. "As expected, this doesn't work." He then adds as the water monster (now on fire) takes another swipe at him. "These things defy natural explanation."

"Pretty sure it's not the first ones we've seen that does that." I mutter and take aim…

_Bang._

I hit the water thing going after Lon'qu square in the chest. The impact reminded me of someone stepping in a puddle pooled on top of a hard surface. But the nail went through the entire body and hit the wall behind it, so…?

"I don't think that did much." I declare. "Pull back."

"Right." Lon'qu agrees and pulls back with Olivia, and we bounce back around the corner. We are then not pursued.

Wait, we're not?

Laurent adjusts his glasses. "They must be guardians of some kind, designed to protect the well against aggressors." He then looks to us. "That was the first time I've ever seen your weapon fail, boss."

"Yeah?" I reload my rifle…because I'm a bit dazed. "Then you should've seen me during the R&amp;D phase; this little baby failed all the time."

Why do I feel so dazed? "Laurent. The magic down here doesn't have any irregular effects, does it?" I ask, though I think I know the answer.

"Supposedly…" Laurent says after a brief (uncomfortable) pause. "The well's water is a mirror for the truth, so it stands to reason that the magic surrounding it would have a similar effect."

Huh.

So does that mean I'm liable to turn into a corpse if I stay here too long? Judging by Laurent's eyes, he certainly thinks that's a possibility.

"Ok then." I stretch. "Olivia, please go and alert the rest of the party that we found the thingie."

"Perhaps you should return instead, sir?" Laurent offers softly.

_He must be trying to avoid taking chances._

Dude's nice.

"I'd love to, but my sense of direction isn't nearly as good as Olivia's." I laugh. "Nor am I as confident with a torch in my hand."

"It's better than fighting a monster that can't be killed." Olivia sighs and gives Lon'qu a peck on the cheek. "Don't get beaten up while I'm gone, dear."

Awwww all of Lon'qu's blood is in his face now~

"You." Lon'qu glares at me.

My face is frozen in an idiotic grin so all I can do is shrug.

_Laurent has turned away from us and Noire has hid her face in her hands._

His glare is so ineffectual when he's blushing like that oh my god it's adorable~

"I'll be back soon." Olivia mutters and I can't see her face but I'm sure she's blushing heavily too eeee~

"Stop that." Lon'qu warns me.

I nod.

_Our face is still frozen in grin shape._

…

Eventually my face settles down from "dumbass grin" to "annoying smirk".

"Seeing you like that is somehow immensely irritating." Lon'qu growls at me.

"Seeing you like that is somehow immensely satisfying." I reply, my dumbass grin coming back. "Let's call it fair, yeah?"

Lon'qu adjusts the straps holding his swords to his waist. "It seems that my m-marriage strikes you as odd."

Did he really just stutter on that?

_Our dumbass grin has returned. Its severity is directly related to the intensity of Lon'qu's glare._

"Nah, it's not odd. It's just adorable, that's all." Quickly let's change the conversation before Lon'qu slaughters the fuck out of us "Let's get this party started, shall we?"

While we're waiting for Olivia to return with news, we've decided to test the waters some more, as it were. Given that the enemy doesn't chase after us at all it's to our benefit to engage with these guardians some more and figure out exactly how they tick.

Plus, if I'm remembering my paralogue gimmicks this is the one where you fight copies of your own units. I hope none of them copies my rifle, because if they do we're kind of screwed.

_We turn around the corner again to see…_

…the puddles of water having returned to their original locations.

I didn't notice this the first time around (might've been because of the murder water) but the central spring (it looks like a large, circular well) seems to be overflowing with water, to the point where there's a massive sheet of it pooled around the spring. Does that overflow produce more of those guardian things?

Given that the water's glowing with (what I believe) is magical power, it is probably responsible for making more guardians…but there's no guardian rising to attack us.

What gives?

"Maybe it's a defensive mechanism that reacts only to hostile intent." Laurent muses and gathers a ball of fire in his hand.

As he expected, a shimmering shape rises from the water and turns into a humanoid thing…followed very closely by a second, vaguely-archer-like shape.

_So that's probably Noire._

Yep. I'm guessing she's instinctively intending to assist Laurent, and this location is interpreting that as intent for battle.

So if we want to use the well for whatever it is we're trying to use the well for, we'll either need to approach the area with a stunning amount of naivety or murder everything.

Seems a little extreme, but ok, we'll play that way.

Laurent, upon seeing the formation of water guardian number one, throws his Fire into the guardian's face.

It does nothing.

"As expected." Laurent sighs and pulls out a Thunder tome. "Let's try this one instead."

_The guard wasn't going to just stand there and take it, so it charges forward at us._

When Laurent isn't taken by surprise, the man is an impressively fast caster, and so the guardian took a Thunder to the face. It seems to be moderately effective, judging by the Guardian reeling from the hit.

The other Guardian was stopped by Noire, who…er. She hit it with her bow. Like…she threw her bow at the target and it smacked the Guardian in the face.

_The other guardian has also developed some__ comically massive breasts._

Maybe Noire got embarrassed? Also, she still isn't transforming.

Anyways.

Noire's thrown bow seemed to have dealt more damage than actually shooting it in the face. So I guess the water guardians are weak to bash damage or something.

_Our observations of the battle meant we are now interested in testing out our theory. Thus, a third guardian was formed._

Lon'qu's the only one without a guardian to fight.

"I wouldn't be much of a swordsman if I could not control my senses." Lon'qu smirks when I bring this up. "I am ready to assist at any time…you only need to ask."

Lon'qu usually doesn't change his tone, but I'm sure he's just a little bit smug right now.

Anyways…how should I fight against my Guardian?

_Bash._

I return my rifle to my back and…calmly wait for the Guardian to move its molasses to striking range.

"It seems that their aggression mirrors our own." Laurent notes, his Guardian moving as slowly and as calculated as he is. "So long as we keep our calm, they will do so too."

…That's nice, but they are still trying to kill us.

Also, Noire is panicky after she tossed her bow, and her Guardian is panicking as much as she is (I think) while still trying to attack her. I'm not sure what's going on over there anymore but it looks like anything but a fight.

Anyways.

We run at the Guardian fighting us and punch it in the face.

_It readily disintegrates, and in our shock we just stare at our fist and the pool of water flowing back to the well._

"At this point I'm not sure if we're dealing damage or if the thing is just responding to our unwillingness to fight." I grumble.

"Indeed." Laurent has stopped trying to fry his Guardian and is instead poking it gently with his finger.

…

_We go for another five minutes, getting progressively less resistance from the Guardians until they eventually returned to their water puddle forms._

Not gonna lie, I expected a bigger fight than what we got.

_When Olivia showed up with a biggest slice of the Shepherds (some of them still had to guard the entrance) we briefed them on what the defense system of the well is._

Hawk then made a secondary discovery.

_Drinking the water from the well stops the Guardians from forming against the drinker._

Makes me wonder if jumping in for a swim would cause a million Guardians to form and kill the swimmer, though.

…

…

_So why are we here?_

Robin wanted us to be?

_Seriously._

Canonically the player party chases Aversa here and a scuffle breaks out. This stop is a part of our overarching plan to hit Valm, which means we were using this temple/crypt/whatever as a marker on our map.

The well itself, though…

According to Chrom, Robin was insistent about visiting the place after hearing about both the possible 'darkness' business approaching them and the well's apparent ability to reveal the truths of a person.

"If the well's effect does seep into the surrounding air, then it's reasonable that Noire's coping mechanism cannot fire." Laurent summarizes.

Noire could not switch to her all-caps mode at all, a fact that apparently unsettled her greatly.

"It just means the real you is weird and nice." Cynthia had (badly) reassured her. "Don't worry about it!"

To actually use the well, we just have to stare into it. Vaike, by virtue of being the most honest, tried it first due to Miriel's urgings.

Vaike looked at it for about ten seconds before he stopped. He was then subsequently very surprised that he was only looking at it for about ten seconds.

"Really? I could've sworn I was in there for a day at least." Vaike had said with some confusion.

We did some further questioning, and…uh. Vaike spent the entire 'day' training with his other half. Apparently. They busted a mountain or something with just their muscles.

I don't know how serious he's being, to be honest…but judging by how his laugh doesn't quite extend as far as it feels like it should he's probably holding something back.

…

Chrom eventually decides that we would take turns staring into the wellspring of truth. Naturally, anybody who doesn't feel like doing it is exempt.

_All of the future children, Hawk, and Nowi opted out of the experience._

…

We cycle through the characters (starting with Chrom), and going down the list.

A very small amount of people (Vaike, Henry) have either very little baggage or were good enough liars that they were happy after looking through the wellspring.

The bulk of the Shepherds all had some form of…thing they didn't want to see the truth about? I guess? We were good enough friends with Miriel for her to tell us about her fears…but fears aren't truths, so…

Point being, a lot of people walked away from the wellspring looking a little bit pensive and a lot bit disturbed.

_So why didn't we do it?_

I turn evil in the future. I'm not exactly keen on seeing what my 'truth' is.

"Or maybe you just want to see what I do first." Robin yawns.

_It's been two hours since we first found the well._

"Or maybe that." I nod. "You sure about this? I feel like the well's doing anything but showing the truth right now."

Robin glances at the Tiki wrapped around our (right) arm. "Whatever gave you that idea?" She asks lightly.

After Tiki had fun staring into the wellspring she annexed our right arm. That was thirty minutes ago and now my arm is entirely numb. I think she fell asleep too, which is really impressive considering we're all standing right now.

_So what are we getting in return for our lost appendage?_

We're petting Tiki's head as if she's a cat.

"Just a thought." I psuedo-shrug. My shoulders are occupied already. "Seriously though: are you sure this is a good idea?"

"I…I hope so." Robin admits. "I'm a little scared about what I'm going to see, but I do believe that finding out is the better idea."

If you're sure…

_Robin walks up to the wellspring and stares into it for a few seconds before breaking away._

…

It's very difficult to feel apprehensive when the wait time is so short. Also it kind of demolishes whatever scary buildup we were trying to go for.

"How do you feel?" I ask.

"Good!" Robin replies…with entirely way too much enthusiasm. "Good." She repeats. "Um…"

I suppose it's impossible for me to gauge what the others have seen if I don't give it a go myself.

Now let's just peel Tiki away from the arm.

…

…

Ok. Here goes.

_Robin slinks off into the darkness while we're busy with the well. The rest of the Shepherds are camped out at the entrance._

_We approach the well and peer into the flowing and yet perfectly flat water surface._

…

Uh.

Huh.

And now I'm standing on a grassy hill.

So…my truth is that I want to buy a pasture or something? I don't get it.

_We look around and see nothing._

At the edge of my vision (and hell, it's not even the edge. I'm guessing maybe 50 meters, tops) I see the very stark break between the rolling green grass and the white, smoky wall rising into the sky.

The draw distance is apparently very short.

"So what do I do now?" I ask out loud.

"Now? We talk." I hear me behind me and spin to see…hello me. Me who's going to be me.

_An older mirror image of ourselves, dressed in a sage robe similar to Emmeryn's (but colored a deep blue instead) smiles slightly at us._

Hoo boy this doesn't bode well. "Are you a mirror of me?" I ask.

"I used to be." It replies cheerfully. On a slightly related note, it seems like everyone I've met so far who turned out to be batshit insane (on some level) have made their initial greeting with happiness, so…uh.

I frown. "Or are you me from the future? Because let's face it you look veteran as hell right now."

"Got it in two." It laughs. "I'm pretty smart, right?"

This can turn into a very weird self-congratulation thing very fast, I see. "So what's my 'truth'? How does this thing work in the first place?"

"It works by talking." It smiles, and two chairs appear out of nowhere. "Sit."

…

Feeling a little bit (a lot bit) weirded out, we take a seat. Mirror!Us does the same…damn. those are the eyes of someone who's seen a lot of shit.

"So you are future me." I sigh. "What gives? Did this happen to everyone? Does this happen to everyone?"

"Can't tell." Future!Ash shakes his head. "Besides, not my problem."

How characteristic of me. Moving on to the main subject. "How bad did it get?"

"Bad." It growls. "Robin fucked us over."

…I can't say I'm surprised. "How?" I'm not happy, but I'm not surprised.

"Robin's pretty close to the shepherds in your timeline, right?" It asks instead.

"Seems to be. What's the problem with yours?"

_And now Robin is a car._

She just needs an oil change. Or something.

"Our Robin was ambivalent, which was the problem." It says. "She was more focused on taking down Grima than establishing supports, and that screwed us over when Valm gave her an offer."

…Yikes?

"Of course, our losses in Plegia weren't helping matters either." It plucks a leaf(blade?) of grass and fiddles with it…as I tend to do whenever I'm nervous.

_Not the picking grass part. The 'I need to have my hands busy' part._

"We couldn't get Plegia settled in time, Chrom was still nursing some critical injuries, and Valm hit like a bag of hammers." Future!Ash sighed. "Icing on the cake? Emmeryn got herself killed by Valm when the war started."

…Come again?

"Yeah." It nods. "The little idiot went to have a talk with Valm and got them to back down for two days. Turns out, they spent those two days figuring out where Emm slept at night and on day three…" It makes the slash gesture across his neck.

Damn. "And Ylisse was ok with it?"

It laughs. "Valmese Blitzkrieg plus information lockdown."

…Double damn.

"Yeah." It grins. "The Valmese Cavalry really wasn't for show. They hit Ferox so hard the entire nation caved in a month…'course, losing Basilio and Flavia didn't help matters." Future!Ash then tosses…where did he get that chess piece? He tosses the White Knight in his hand onto the table. "That's when I stepped in."

The table between us turns into a chessboard, because apparently we care about symbolism around here.

_On our side: a smattering of pawns and knights. On the other: pawns pawns pawns pawns pawns_

"Fucking uphill battle of all uphill battles." Future!Ash growls. "Once Ylisse realized that their leadership was decapitated the nobles went into an uproar…and immediately began fighting themselves, because Chrom was still stuck fighting Plegia. And Lissa, as wonderful as she is, wasn't recognized as a legitimate heir to the throne because she had no brand."

He laughs bitterly. "You know there's a catch, right?"

I nod.

"Well, a lot of the nobles started showing up with fake brands." He laughs some more. "Gotta hand it to them. The princess of Ylisse wasn't legitimate because she had no brand but had blood status, but they were legit because they had a brand! God damn that was a fucked up year."

He shakes his head and picks up his Knight, the only white one among the all black pieces on our side of the field. "I had to bop a few heads." He begins knocking some of the black knights off of the table. "Because nobody would listen to me…and why would they? I, a no-name Shepherd, literally showed up out of nowhere to assume command of the entire nation. If it weren't for Maribelle, shit would've never gotten done."

Maribelle, huh…?

"Let me guess, she threw Themis behind you." Having the food production of an entire nation on lockdown is usually pretty important.

He nods. "Yep. Maribelle tossing her public support behind us made it a hell of a lot easier to get the less polarizing nobles to grant us levies and funds…first time I ever had to campaign, too." He picks up some pawns and they turn white. "And then Valm hit us." He sweeps the pawns on the other side (they are red) and slam it into the black ones. "It goes without saying that a nation in civil war doesn't last long against a fundamentally superior force."

He tilts his head pauses for a second, then nods slightly. I recognize that pause as my brain going 'well technically…'

"To their credit, most of the nobles, even when rebelling, fought against Valm for every inch of Ylissean soil…but against the best cavalry of the two continents, levy infantry can only do so much." He then gets a small smirk. "And then we got lucky."

Lucky how? Technology?

"Look at this." He pulls out something very similar to my railgun from underneath the table. "This is our rifle." He offers it to me for examination.

Hmm. "It's like what I have." I turn it around and balance it in my hand. "Heftier, maybe."

"Yeah? What did you do?"

"Quad-rail linear rifle." I respond. "This weapon's longer, too." I see some kind of rigging on the tip of the gun and tap it. "Bayonet?"

He nods in satisfaction. "Yep. I made rifle corps ala 19th century folk. Guess what our power source is?"

Hmm. "Dragonstones?"

"Hell yeah." He laughs…but that's the hollowest laugh I think I've ever heard. "We got Nowi to thank for it."

So…

He has a hard glint in his eye. "Wanna know what's really bullshit? Nowi died because she went up against three Risen Manaketes. She was on the back foot until both the Valmese and Ylissean armies joined in to rain arrows until nothing moved."

Damn.

"Best part?" He makes a gun with his hand and puts it to his own temple. "I gave that fire order on our side."

…seriously?

"Nah doesn't know about that part." He chuckle/sighs. "And thank Naga for that…well, I can chalk it up to a case of bullshit information." Future!Ash throws the pawn in his hand over his shoulder (hard). "Anyways, because she died we were able to get our grubby little paws on her Dragonstone…and the fragmented Dragonstones of the dead Manaketes. Out of curiosity, did you guys get those Manaketes yet?"

…can I just say I'm liking Future!Me a little bit less now? "Yeah; Yarne took care of the first one."

"Lucky." He grins. "We had to throw bodies at it until it finally died, and the Taguel just said 'fuck this' and never bothered helping."

Not even Panne?

_Goes to reason that, without Chrom, Panne would not have given Future!Ash her support._

"Anyways, we found harnessable power in those fragments, and we were able to make gun corps." He sighs. "We push Valm back to the coastline at the end of year two and there's a stalemate for the next two years. We were never able to establish naval superiority because Valm kept harassing our coastline."

And then you get married. I get married. I pseudo get married. Or something.

Future!Ash rolls his eyes and stretches out his arms. "Well, I had Valm on one hand, Plegia on the other, and the other parts of Ylisse in my asshole. Those two years of standoff were pretty bad." He does the 'well technically' head tilt again. "Silver lining. Between the Risen, Valm, and Plegia, and Ferox being fucked up all kinds of badly we pretty much annexed Ferox, so there's that."

He then sighs. "But the biggest game changer comes in at the end of standoff year two."

"Robin defects."

"Damn straight." He nods. "Fucking hell, I still don't know how Valm contacted Robin and what made her change her mind and it's been a decade after the fact."

…what?

"Anyways, Robin converts and Walhart, being the harsh-but-fair asshole, immediately gives her control of the entire anti-Plegia expeditionary force." He shakes his head. "Putting literally the best fucking tactician behind the wheels of literally the best fucking army is literally fucking bullshit."

_All of the red pawns on the chessboard have been replaced by queens._

"Robin curbstomps Plegia with Valm's best troops and pretty much conquer the entire country before we could make any kind of headway into Plegia from our end and help, or something." Future!Ash growls. "The fact that Plegia massed most of their troops on the Plegia-Ylissean border didn't help our case much. Guns are great, but when you field them en masse the other side figures out how to circumvent them quickly enough."

He sighs. "Anyways, silver lining: since the Valmese army isn't nearly as soft as Chrom, they reach the Plegian capitol, take it with almost no losses, string Validar out like a marionette, and then execute him in front of the entire capitol populace."

…wow. Wait.

_He sweeps all of the red queens off the table._

"I know, right? 'So why did Grima resurrect?'" He smirks and taps his temple…I'm a bit of an asshole, I see. "We'll get to that. With Plegia destroyed from the ground up, Valm subjugated the entirety of Plegia and took it all as territory. Robin was then assigned as the governor of said Plegian territories…and yeah." He sees me frowning. "It gets bad from there."

"So you disowned Robin entirely?" I ask, because that's what it sounds like.

"She disowned us." Future!Ash snaps. I have anger issues too, apparently. "Credit where it's due, when Robin finished mopping up what's left of Plegia she reached out to us diplomatically…but unfortunately for her she tried to do it as…well, ok, fine." He scratches his face. "It really wouldn't have mattered whether if she came to us as a Valmese General or as Robin, nobody was in the mood for listening to her."

I find that a little hard to believe. "Not even Chrom?"

He laughs. "Robin upped and left without even a goodbye note. If anything, Chrom was the most vocal about his loss of faith in her…of course, losing Shepherds in combat didn't help keep his mood grounded any."

So…

Future!Ash nods knowingly. "Yeah. Without Robin doing our tactics…and without the ability to soft reset the game, people died. Chrom wasn't all too happy about the glaring new weakness in his outfit called 'overdependence on their genius'." He stretches. "Well, point being, we had a truce for about, oh, three years? And then Robin kicks it or something."

_His tone is one of supreme indifference._

…you're very nonchalant about this, Future!Me.

He does catch the confused look I give him. "Hey, after years of not giving a fuck and with Valmese Plegia's counterespionage as strong as it was, are you really surprised that I knew nothing about how Robin bit it?"

…no, not really, but. "I expected you to care a little more."

"Then you're gravely mistaken." He laughs. "I don't have to explain why, now do I?"

…no, I guess not. I know I have a bit of a control issue…though I daresay it's less of an issue for Current!Me than it is for Future!Me. "Yeah…so Robin dies, then Grima goes up?"

"Almost immediately." He emphasizes it with a snap his fingers. "Grima goes up and Risen starts pouring out of the Plegian capital. Like…it's what Ermor would've felt like if it was real, probably."

…nice to know he's still a bit of a goof at heart.

_Ermor is a playable faction in a videogame. It is Rome plus Zombie Apocalypse._

"Valm gets caught off guard, Ylisse-Ferox gets caught off guard, everybody scrambles to fight the giant death dragon." He stops for a second. "We muster every air unit we have and get Chrom apotheosized for the last battle…"

I'm not sure that's the right way to use that word.

_Our eyebrows go up._

"What? It's fitting." Future!Me folds his arms. "Point being, we rally everything we had and throw it against Grima." He slams his hand on the table. "Guess what we forgot?"

Oh shit.

He catches my expression. "Damn straight. Grima's on at full blast and we're no longer in a videogame designed to give the players a fighting chance, so the attack fails entirely." He throws a halfhearted salute. "Rip fliers."

_RIP but pronounced, y'know, rip._

"We were pretty lucky afterwards, kinda, sorta." He sighs deeply. "At the very least we were able to collect Cordelia and Cherche for burial."

…Sumia? No body was found, huh?

"Icing on the cake: Grima sent fliers after what was left of our army and tore it to ribbons." He holds up his right arm and I now notice that it's fake…then again, he's been hiding it inside that massive robe of it. "I got Maribelle to thank for this…I'll probably do that after we're done here."

…? That's an odd way to phrase things.

"But after that, we were fucked, so Grima turns his attention to Valm and systematically eradicate the entire continent. Last I heard the population count was in the thousands." He says indifferently. "But Grima's Valm hunt left us with time to rebuild, even though we were suffering from manpower and veteran shortages at that point…"

_He holds up his left hand._

"Five years." He waves his left hand slightly. "That's how much time we got. We needed fifty."

"So Grima turned back around and finished what he started, huh?"

_His nodding motion is miniscule. _"The fucker's thorough, I'll give him that. In those five years we scrounged whatever resources we had, relocated every last man, woman and child to Ylisstol, installed artillery pieces on the walls and then pounded his face in with everything we had. Ever tried to compete with a god on burst damage?"

_He answers his own question with a disappointed shake of his head._

"It's been three years since then." He says…with a tinge of bitterness. "Grima's just fucking with us at this point."

…

I…

The hand he was dealt with was way worse than what I had to deal with, that's for sure.

…

Ok, let's step back for a second.

First off, it looks like my and Robin's role within the shepherds shifted. I'm the traitor and she's the loyalist (to some degree). Which is good. Anything that makes Robin less vulnerable is a good thing.

Second, I wander what Valm could've offered Robin to get her to change sides? Obviously Future!Ash didn't and doesn't care enough to pursue the reason any.

_We know that, at the core, Robin knows about Grima and is willing to take steps actively to combat it._

And the Valmese army, though of varying skills, is pound for pound better than the Ylissean army as a whole.

…So Valm just had to point to its army and go "Look at all of these 5000 Almost-Fredricks you can use" and Robin flipped sides just like that? As much as Future!Ash is implying that his version of Robin is way more goal oriented, something tells me it wasn't as simple as that.

…moreover, what happened to…uh, what's her face? The Dark Flier lady? Aversa?

_What happened to her in our current timeline?_

No clue…which is worrying in of itself. I should ask Hawk when I leave here. I should also ask Future!Me.

His response: "Aversa? No idea. She popped up during the Gangrel war and then vanished since."

Which doesn't tell me much, to be honest.

So…ok. What should I do about Gangrel then?

_Gangrel?_

Uh. No. Walhart. What should I do about Walhart?

If I'm reading between the lines correctly, then the Future Timeline would've had a much more reasonable chance of victory (or at least would've had a more even fight) if they weren't busy trying to kill each other. To that end, it seems like winning the war against Valm and sending it into a public order death spiral would be…bad.

So…

_Option A: we kill Walhart and let the continent go to pieces._

Yay continental civil war.

_Option B: we save Walhart and (somehow) ally with him._

Yay betrayal and complete loss of trust from our current allies (if we do it wrong).

_Option C: we leverage our political capital as the Lord of the Coasts and unity Valm underneath us instead._

Even if that was feasible, that would make us Walhart v2.0 and I'm sure that will go over well with the people who just uninstalled Walhart 1.0 for its security issues.

_You never know. We could be the Windows XP that the world needs._

Hm. Either way, we'll need to talk with Chrom and Say'ri to see what we can do.

…

"Are you done thinking things over?" Future!Ash says with a wry smile when we make eye contact. I'm naturally introverted so whenever I'm talking to someone one on one I'll make eye contact first before opening my mouth.

"More or less." I nod. "I'll have to properly plan things out before we go further, it looks like."

"You finally grew out of just winging it?"

Asshat. "I'm still winging it most of the time, it's just that I make sure I get more wings first."

Future!Me smirks. "Sure, let's go with that."

Asshat plus one, but eh. "So how do I stop…uh…" I gesture to the infinity grassland all around us. "How do I get out of this?"

"Oh, that." He says…almost distractedly.

He then takes a deep breath and exhales it quickly. I do it whenever I'm switching topics.

"Well, you've received the truth you were asking for." He says…did I? "Don't look at me like that. You got the response to your question and I was as thorough as I could be under the circumstances."

Is that how this works? "Sure, but I didn't know that counted as an official question."

He grins. "You should've read the EULA before you used the Well then." I don't like that grin. It's maniacal. "I gave you the truth you wanted, so now you get to give me mine. Only then do you get to leave."

Huh. "I don't see what I have to offer, but ok…not like I have a choice, right?"

He shrugs. "You do, kinda, since you made this connection in the first place."

That doesn't make a lot of sense.

…

He then pulls out an airman's rifle (my make, not his) and slides it across the now suddenly larger table to me.

…

Um?

"How'd you get this?" I ask, feeling the weight of the gun in my hand.

He doesn't answer, but instead looks…through me, it feels.

That's one hell of a thousand yard stare he has.

"I've just about had it." He…

…Oh.

That's what's going on.

_Future!Ash sits up straighter and offers his hands, palms up._

"It's been a hell of a decade, younger me." He smiles slightly. "Let me be a little selfish?"

…

…I…

…

_We take the airman's rifle._

Was it this heavy before?

"I…I guess I don't have the right to make the not giving up speech, huh?" I laugh…it sounds so ridiculously forced.

"Would you listen if I did?" He chuckles.

…

"I suppose not."

…

…

I arm the rifle.

.

.

.

{ === + === }


	39. Valm Campaign - Endgame 3

{ === + === }

That was…different.

…

…

_We stand there, staring blankly into the water, for a few minutes._

…

…

Um…now what?

_Head back to camp?_

…Yeah. Yeah, let's do that.

…

_As we walk…_

_…_

Hm? That's Miriel. Hi Miriel, what are you doing examining the walls of this place?

_She hears our footsteps._

"How was your introspection?" Miriel asks.

I'm very glad she's focused on the wall right now because I'm pretty sure I don't have a poker face on right now. "It was…something."

_Miriel, catching the hollowness of our voice, turns and observes us closely instead. A small frown forms on her face and she purses her lips._

I need to work on my post-trauma persona, apparently.

"I surmise that your vision was of the same gravity as Robin." Miriel sighs after about three seconds of keen observation. "The two of you seem to have some unresolved truths."

…Her wording is a little suspect. "Where's Robin?"

"She was headed towards the camp."

…

Oh, right. Only a few seconds have passed in real time.

…

Man. What can I even do about this?

…

_Eventually we get our head back together and head back to the camp._

_…_

Oh look, it's snowing again. That's going to slow us down when we leave. Very glad we're indoors.

Why did Valm choose to start a campaign in the winter again?

Where is…there is Robin. She's talking with Chrom. Probably about the snow and how we're going to get out of this place when the snow ends.

_You know the snow isn't going to be any more than a foot deep, right?_

A foot deep is still really damn deep when we're trying to push wagons along them. I think I should see to making some studded wheels or something.

…

Well, if Robin's preoccupied right now, then let's start with Objective B instead.

…if I could remember what Objective B _was_ this would be a lot easier.

…

Oh, right. Right. Uh…

I wanted to talk with the Future Kids and see about exactly what happened to Future!Ash, and the most knowledgeable person about the subject would be…Lucina, who is currently somewhere in the south parts of Valm.

Next down the list of knowledge would be Laurent.

…

_Insert talking montage here._

…

Hrm.

So according to Laurent and a very dog-eared and beaten up notebook, Future!Ash's death was attended to but the reason was never confirmed. For the sake of simplicity (and to ensure that the populace wasn't discouraged by the death of their leadership) he was officially recorded as having been killed by rebel elements.

_Why rebels and not, say, the Risen?_

Apparently the situation around the time was so bad that rebels were seen as beneficial, as they indicated the existence of organized resistance and, thus, live humans.

Laurent, being the curious little dude that he is, poked around during Future!Ash's burial and found out that he sustained a piercing wound in his head. According to the little sketch in his notebook, the wound was right between his eyes.

Which, I feel compelled to point out, is pretty much how I shot Future!Me.

_So what does that mean?_

It means that…er, it _could_ mean that the story of the well 'showing the truth' is distorted. Truth is a terribly subjective thing to begin with and it changes constantly with the presentation of more data, so a well that shows the 'truth' is a little bit sketchy to begin with.

In entirely related news, I would've liked it if the well just gave me a powerpoint presentation instead. It would've been so much faster and less bullet intensive.

Non-sequitur aside, the fact that I saw Future!Ash and shot him through the head (and it apparently being how Future!Ash died) makes me believe that the well is a lesser Outrealm gate…or something similar. I don't know what's going to happen if I stick my head in the well again and to be perfectly honest I'm too scared to try.

_You're very nonchalant about this assisted suicide thing._

I feel like if I didn't take this cavalier attitude I would just curl up into a ball and weep bitterly. That would be bad for all parties involved.

…

Where was I?

_The well._

Right. I think it's a lesser Outrealm gate, per Bubba's information that every dimension or whatever has a major gate and a bajillion lesser ones. The question now is 'why does it show what it does?'

Is there some reason it let us talk to future Ash? Maybe it's based on mind reading?

_What was our thought process when we went into the well?_

It was…"Robin's acting weird, I wonder why."

If the well ran on thought interpretation then getting Future!Ash to talk to us was a horrible way to answer the question related to Robin, especially because the question was never answered.

So…hrm. So we should ask around and see what people saw? But that feels like a big faux pas for some reason. Let's at least ask Robin when she's free.

…

I wish I had like a week to just sit down and reason this out.

_Buuuut?_

…But we need to prepare for the final push, and I shouldn't let myself get distracted by this to the point where somebody dies because of my negligence. There's a trope for this, isn't there?

Ok. Deep breath. Inhale…exhale.

…

…

_So what did we do in the end?_

…We asked around for stories, because ultimately my curiosity got the better of me.

Vaike said that he saw himself training so hard he could punch mountains to submission.

_And the authenticity of the story is…?_

Zero. Vaike is a terrible liar and he has body tells everywhere…but given the nature of the subject matter we're not pushing further.

…Next.

Fredrick saw the Fredrick Fitness Hour as a worldwide phenomenon. I hope he's lying but I can't tell.

Stahl had a delicious sandwich. Probably true.

Miriel inherited my Great Library. I'm honored but I feel like she's lying.

Maribelle saw her parents and asked them about their betrayal. Her parents admitted nothing. I'm pretty sure she's telling the truth, and I'm also pretty sure her meeting with them ended on a sour note.

Lon'qu said something noncommittal about Olivia. This answer is entirely useless because I probably influenced it with my dumbass grin.

Sumia said she saw her and Chrom having so many children. Good for her, I guess?

…

Everyone else gave noncommittal answers, chose not to answer, or evaded the question.

…

Chrom saw the bad future. He…refuses to go into further detail.

Robin…

...

"I saw you stab me in the back."

That was Robin's first line when I asked her about what she saw.

…well, ok, the first line after like two minutes of uncomfortable, confused, and terrifying silence.

Fair to say I was pretty surprised.

So naturally my response was "Weird, my guy said you stabbed me in the back too."

Which got a surprised laugh from Robin, and from there the uncomfortable silence was broken.

_Broken by promises of mutual future murder._

And obviously the thing to do after becoming friends through promises of mutual homicide is to share stories.

…

The short version of it is this: Robin literally saw…Me Of Some Kind gut her like a fish.

"But the You from my well was a lot more offense oriented." Robin said. "And he didn't have a fake arm."

I wonder. "So then why did the well show you a different future? Is it even relevant?"

"Was your future any more relevant than mine?" She wonders back.

We both shrugged at this as honestly it isn't enough information to know.

Or, rather, I KNOW I shot my guy in the head, and I KNOW Laurent's future dude was probably shot in the head. The connection I'm making is reasonable but has no concrete evidence to back it up…Laurent's notebook, though good, doesn't count.

Likewise, Robin KNOWS her Ash stabbed Future!Robin in the back. My Future!Me had utterly glazed over Robin's whereabouts post betrayal, so it's not unreasonable to assume the two futures are shared…but again, no concrete evidence.

_We then spent the remainder of the day dissecting our…visions, for a lack of a better term, with Robin (and Tiki)._

Tiki just kind of showed up.

Ultimately, though we didn't get any new information through story swapping, Robin did resolve to learn how to auto-cast spells.

_She didn't describe it as such._

No. We gave her the idea, describing spells that "activate without thought"…despite having zero belief that they'd show up in a Fire Emblem Universe ever. Either way, I figure having Robin know how to cast on predetermined triggers would be helpful if she ever ends up flipping.

_What kind of defenses are we taking in the event that we are the traitor instead?_

Well…as Robin puts it, "the only way you'd betray Chrom is if you go insane, so I'm not too worried about putting you out of your misery if that happens."

She even said that with a bright, cheery grin, too. We didn't really have a response so we did the next best thing.

_Which was to hug Robin for zero reason. You know how close you were to dying at that moment, right?_

Yeah, but I figured it was a risk worth taking. Plus she wasn't against it after the initial shock wore off.

_…At what point did "let's suddenly approach the only person who would actually shoot us when given probable cause" strike you as a reasonable path of action?_

Uh…I'll get back to you on that.

_Oh for the love of_

…

[The Next Day]

…

With our curiosity satisfied (Laurent even took a sample of the well water) we decided to brave the snow with our wagons and continue on our path of emperor slaying.

"Given the ground difference, we're going to change our route slightly so we'll get to the shoreline faster." Robin said in our briefing. "Until we do though, get some snow on these things" She taps a wagon and its cover "and let's get moving before it snows again."

_Why are we covering our wagons with snow?_

For camouflage; Robin's relying on snow blindness to keep ourselves hidden from the sky.

…

Let the move through the snow commence…

_You sound so excited._

I can see all the snow.

Ugh.

…

[Elsewhere, 3rd Person camera]

[Not happening as the same time as the 1st Person Camera, mind]

…

The Southern Expedition featuring Basilio, Flavia, Lucina, and Virion (and the Halloween Squadron) has hit a snag.

From the time they left up to around three days ago, they were doing pretty well: striking at garrisons, destroying convoys, harassing troops, and generally making a nuisance of themselves to the point where the rebel elements in the Valmese South could launch concerted attacks against Valm largely unimpeded.

This was, naturally, the reason for their snag. Because of their resounding success, Valm deployed the army belonging to Excellus and cracked down on the entire region.

Regardless of how Excellus is portrayed in canon, in reality he is incredibly competent at anti-guerilla warfare…especially when fielding a superior army.

…

Fun part is: Excellus's army wasn't actually the problem.

…

It was dusk, and the allied expedition force's leadership gathered in their command tent, fresh from their latest sustained attack from the Valmese forces.

"If we do nothing, they run circles around us. If we do something, they run circles around us." Basilio sighs, tossing the latest combat report (hastily put together by the Halloween Squadron) aside. "We're not having the best of luck recently, are we?"

"I will never make fun of fatass ever again." Halloween One said semi-solemnly. "He's got an eye for movement I never expected from his lardass body."

"Why didn't you just shoot him?" Flavia asks in a borderline accusatory tone. "In the last battle, you had a fair amount of time before their Wyverns forced you to pull back."

Halloween One didn't miss that little bite in Flavia's tone. "He had tower shields surrounding his whole tent and hid behind every last one." She replies sharply. "I wasn't gonna scare him off _now_ if it meant I couldn't kill his ass later."

"Ladies, please be civil." Virion muttered out of courtesy. Neither party listened to him.

"When will that be?" Flavia sneers. "Your unwillingness to fight in risky situations has cost us more men than it saved."

Halloween One suppressed her anger by leaning back in her chair, so two of its legs are now no longer connected with the ground, and then putting her feet on the table. "My unwillingness to fight is the entire reason why our unit is workable. If the rebs had better stuff to guard us with we wouldn't need to pull back at all."

"A fact that we are painfully aware of." The rebel Griffon Knight (one of just four, in fact) said non-apologetically. The two parties had talked it out beforehand and though Halloween One was unhappy about the entire situation she knew better than to make it sound as if it was a personal affront.

"We should be more worried about what's going to happen in the future." Basilio reminds the two with a growl. "Like it or not, the Halloween Squadron is our greatest asset, and the enemy know this."

"Damn straight." Halloween One grin's was positively demonic.

_I wonder what Ash will say if his squadron of specialists came back rude and crude? _Basilio mused. "His royal fatness will certainly be attacking us tomorrow, if not tonight. What should our plan of action be in the upcoming days?"

"We push them back." Flavia said automatically. Her Feroxi blood was screaming for payback.

"We back off." Halloween One said at the same time.

The two glared at each other again.

"They'll just pursue us if we run." Flavia said confrontationally.

"They'll just bury us with numbers if we fight." Halloween One said, also confrontationally.

"There is still the active risk of Walhart himself jumping into the fray." Lucina reminded everyone.

"'That must be avoided at all costs.' I remember." Flavia nods, repeating what Lucina has said every time the name 'Walhart popped up in conversations. "But will he actually strike at us? I imagine the main force will be causing him enough trouble that he can't easily leave the capital."

Virion shakes his head. "Walhart is a frontline leader. He will not stay to administer a city when there is an enemy to be fought in the field…and I am sure our campaign's effectiveness has caught his attention far more readily than an easily identifiable army."

The allied strike force has done so much damage at this point that the southern parts of Valm are in open rebellion, with some of the ruling houses raising the banners of nations previously conquered.

_To be fair: The southern part of Valm was the newest parts of the empire and thus most prone to this kind of open rebellion in the first place._

"In other words, he's going to ignore our main army because his main army can find it easier." Halloween One grumbles. "Sucks to be him, then."

"I can never understand your boundless faith in your lord commander." The Griffon Knight shakes his head. "He seems larger than life."

"Know that she sees him through tinted lens." Virion laughs. "Though I can assure you, with the combined might of Ash's equipment and Robin's tactics, any army will be hard pressed to score a victory against them in the field."

_No love for Chrom? _Flavia resists a roll of her eyes. "If Walhart arrives, what's our best course of action?"

"We run." Lucina said matter-of-factly. Though she never fought him in person and what she knew was based entirely on history books (and those tend to be exaggerated) she was fairly certain that Walhart was Really Bad News™.

"Just like that?" Flavia folds her arms. "Our entire force can be stopped by one man? Halloween can be stopped by just one man?"

"Like hell we can." Halloween takes her legs off the table and her chair settles back to the ground with a soft thump. "But one man isn't an army."

"I imagine Walhart will be able to hold us in position long enough for the rest of his army to surround us." Virion summarizes. "If that happens, then we would have truly lost our operation, to say nothing of our lives."

"For the record, if that happens we're bailing on all of you." Halloween One declares. "Ash's gear comes first."

"Thank you for your honesty." Flavia says with distain. "What about the Hikibi?"

"Hibiki." Lucina corrects her. "And while there is a river for them to sail into, it would make the ship too vulnerable to land-based assaults."

"Hah." Basilio stretches. "So we're packing our bags and heading east, then?"

"The string of constant retreats is already bad for morale." A rebel NPC General resists. "If we tell the men to retreat, it could hurt their morale further."

"Men without morale are better than men dead." Virion replies automatically before regretting it slightly.

"As you should well know." The General sneers. "We joined with your forces because we believed that you were truly trying to stop Valm this time. If you are planning to retreat, then our joint operations will end here."

"Fuck off then." Halloween One says in a very Ash-like fashion (read: with zero tact and diplomatic prowess).

Predictably, the room sits in a shocked silence for the next few seconds.

The General actually needed those few seconds to realize that, yes, Halloween One was being supremely rude. "I beg your pardon?"

"No, seriously." Halloween One adds when she sees the General stare at her in disbelief. "If you're gonna throw away your army just to _annoy_ Valm, then kindly fuck right off." She adjusts her belt to make sure her airman's rifle is in reach. "I'm not gonna work with someone who tosses aside an army without any kind of objective to make up for it."

"We-our objective is to reclaim our homeland!" The General slams his fist on the table. He's entirely aware that

"That's not an objective." Halloween One said coldly. "What concrete gains are you going to make by having a stand here?"

The General had never intended to make a stand in their current position, which held zero value as a military objective. He had simply brought up the idea of their army leaving as an effort to keep the allied forces operating in the area.

Thus, he stayed silent, unhappy that his bluff was called.

"Damn straight." Halloween One said with finality, being the only person in the room that did not realize the bluff for what it was.

"Stop making our lives harder, girly." Basilio growls at Halloween One. "I understand that you're angry about not having the same operational freedoms as when we started, but don't take it out on us."

Halloween One simply sulks.

_Looks like Ash may have overestimated her command capabilities. _Virion sighs. "Regardless, we should consider moving south quickly. There's a ferry service we can then use to expedite our trip to the coastline, where the Hibiki will provide us support as necessary."

"However, Valm has a cavalry detachment in front of us if we take that course of action." Lucina pitches in. "It will be another battle with a time limit."

Basilio punches his palm with his fist. "Sounds familiar."

Lucina allows herself a small smile. "If all goes well, we should-"

A crackling in her ear caused her to stop and draw her Falchion immediately.

_Like her father, she would much rather use a more conventional weapon against human opponents, but she doesn't carry one around while in camp._

"Valm's moving for a night raid." Halloween Two announces, having been set to patrol duty even in the night. "They're coming for us. Lots of torches."

The tent was instantly filled with motion as everyone scrambled to their positions.

"Can we VTOL?" Halloween One asks quickly while taking her Thor anti-ground cannon and several boxes of nails from a half-empty cart sitting next to the command wagon.

"Not sure, verniers are squeaky." Halloween Two replied worriedly. "Output is fine though."

Due to overuse, the cruise engines on their Pegasus…or, more accurately, the downward facing parts of the engine exhausts were suffering constant mechanical failures to the point where Halloween Two was afraid to use them to take off.

_Taking off is the most taxing on those engines._

While the two had the knowledge to service the Cruise Engines, they didn't have the spare parts.

"Got it, I'm showing." Halloween One took out a small rod and lit the tip with a flare that altered colors between green and red. "Come pick me up."

Within seconds, a Pegasus Knight trailing orange particles descended upon her location.

"That's going to ruin our night cover." Halloween One remarks as she mounts. "Can we mask it somehow?"

"We can turn the engine off after we get up." Halloween Two offers. "I can't keep my flying steady if we do though."

"That's fine, it's not like we need accuracy at night anyway." One secures herself to the Pegasus with practiced speed. "Ok, go!"

As they rushed straight down the camp to gain speed for their takeoff, Halloween One heard a chilling declaration from Lucina.

"Walhart sighted! Basilio is engaging!"

…

…

[First Person Camera]

…

…

It's been two days since we left the temple thingy.

So, first off, fuck the snow (again). Fuck wetness in general, in fact.

The roads are a mess, so the wagons are a mess, so our movement speed is a mess, and to top it off its cloudy with a chance of rain so our morale is a mess too.

_The army's pretty badly disciplined if rain is enough to sap morale._

It's a lot of little things, really. The worst part is that earlier today we saw Griffon Knights overhead, and since we can't mask our trails in the mud there's literally nothing we can do to hide from them. As far as I'm concerned, Valm knows we're on the move.

_And on the psychological front?_

We…I, have decided to simply be ok with the outcome.

_…what?_

I mean, the well showed…something that could have and yet could have not been the truth, if both Robin and my stories are considered canon, so I figured I'll just be happy with the current situation and handle it as it comes. Because…if Robin decides to go 'fuck it' and turn on us the one stopping her will not be me.

And if I'm the one destined to go nuts then there's really nothing I can do at that point beyond get killed, so…

_I can't tell if your mental state is one of suicidal optimism or maniacal depressiveness._

Can't it be both?

…

Aanyways, by the end of day two, everybody's not exactly happy with the sky.

In terms of the actual progression, we made it to the designated coastal area just fine. Given that this is now Valmese core territories, we decided against stocking up at the closest village and have opted instead to make a beeline towards the Valmese Gate and…storm it?

"Did you think this through?" I can't help but ask Robin. Not for the first time.

"Perfectly." Robin replies, also not for the first time.

Also, tangent? I make the best goddamn heated blankets.

_We are currently using a magically enchanted blanket as a massive cape cuddling tent thing. It doesn't provide heat (fire spells can't do that) so what it does instead is to trap in residual heat through creative uses of fire and wind magic instead._

By 'we' I mean me, Robin, Tiki, Nowi, and Nah.

_Big crowd._

Yeah. Tiki (per her odd airheaded status) kind of just showed up. Nowi was apparently shadowing Tiki, and demanded to be allowed in.

Nah…

Minor tangent to the tangent: we're sitting in a wagon rather than on the ground, so the massive blanket is covering the entire wagon. Additionally, we have no issues abusing our magic to drive the wagon around with our wind magic. We can't go _far_, but it's not like I intended for this to be a combat thing. I just intend to bother people by silently rolling up behind them.

Tangent over.

Nah was standing somewhere in the periphery and eying our blanketwagon with some very well disguised desire…but we can tell she wanted to jump in, if only because were the situation reversed it's what I would want. So Nah happily jumped into the wagon too.

_That's not what happened._

…Ok, fine. We drove our wagon and performed a drive-by kidnapping, to Nah's halfhearted refusal.

Anyway, the wagon is now snuggly and a little bit crowded.

"This isn't helping me work, you know?" Robin points out.

"I know." I grin. "It's fine, right?"

"Totes fine." Nowi snuggles against Robin.

Robin pats Nowi's head. "Pretty sure you're not the one doing the work here."

_Nowi and Nah are the only ones who have nothing of tactical value to add to the conversation. _

Kind of sad Nowi's in that mix, given her age.

_Speaking of which, why are we spending time with Robin?_

Chrom's orders. We brought our information to Chrom (the whole 'we might be the baddies here' business) and he decided that the best way for the two of us to avoid the inevitable betrayal is to become better friends than we currently are.

Now keep in mind he gave this advice while Lissa and Sumia squeed at us in the background, so I'm not sure how much of this advice is genuine assistance and how much of it is just shipping.

_There is no way for the active mind to know this without Chrom explicitly bringing it up: Ash, though respected, is in no way considered friendly by the rest of the Shepherds due to his approach to warfare._

Either way, it meant Robin could draft plans while I sat around and did nothing.

_While Robin drafted plans we made spellpaper._

Yeah, that. As Robin pointed out yesterday, my combat power is heavily reliant on there being a squadron to fly with…and on being mounted.

Right now I'm pretty much working as an 'off' class and…it shows. When we're not just sitting around we're sparring (kinda) with Robin and Tiki. Both of them can _easily _kick my ass around the block.

_We didn't use our rifle._

We _couldn't _use our rifle. Sure, it was practice and thus it wasn't loaded, but the threat of the airman rifle didn't stop the two girls at all. To wit:

Robin would bat the rifle out of the way with a wind spell or dazzle my eyes with a thunder spell every time I brought the gun around, and then proceed to smite my ass into the ground.

Tiki would find literally all of my blind spots and just mess with me from there. Side note: apparently the poor night vision of my right eye has developed into something more serious (in that it will fail spot checks if the subject in question dazzles said eye with magic) so I've been told to be more aware of that.

This will more than likely bite me in the ass in the worst of ways, I'm sure.

Anyways, because of my experience in squadron based combat, and because our version of squadron based combat is so different from everyone else's form of squadron based combat, AND because most of my experience is in aerial combat…I'm kind of shit on the ground and don't play well with others.

_We're loners still?_

Not…well, in a sense, yes: we're good at teamwork but only with the squadron we've spent years training with. Our overreliance on guns shows up here, because the only one who has a weapon like ours is Cherche and she's not a ground pounder by any stretch of the imagination.

…

After another hour of planning, Robin finally gives up. "Ugh. You're a lot more trouble than you're worth, you know that?" She grumbles at me.

"Thanks?" I grin and give her a reassuring pat on the back.

"That wasn't a complement." She grumbles harder…but leans back a bit, so I guess I have permission to give backrubs. "Your weapon loadout is terrible."

I can only guess why. "It's not _that_ bad."

She…ooh, that's a glare right there. "Why couldn't you have learned to use something normal like an axe or a spear?"

Hmm.

_She apparently catches a not-too-kind expression on our face._

"Oh, I'm sorry." She suddenly backpedals.

What? "Why?"

_We were surprised enough to stop the backrub._

"You had a really scary expression." Tiki replies, going over Robin's notes…why's she going over Robin's notes? "Was it something she said?"

It was that noticeable? "I don't have a good history with the whole 'normal' idea." Shrug, play it off as the overreaction it is... "Sorry, didn't mean to scare you."

"Huh." Robin takes mental notes. "Well, either way. That poleaxe of yours is causing me so many issues."

Was I really that obvious, though? I know I remark on my lack of a poker face but still, it's a bit unlike me. "It's just a spear that enjoys slashing too, how bad can it be?"

"It's bad because of your stupid shoes." Robin laughs.

"If only you did something else besides charge in with your shoes." Tiki says offhand. Singsongs…a little, offhand.

Is she actually a lizard? Like are manaketes actual reptiles?

_What brought up that question?_

Because my awesome blanket is warm and she's more active.

_Does the term 'tenuous' mean anything to you?_

Never heard of it. "What's wrong with my wind shoes?"

"It's hard to find a position for it." Robin replies. "It's too slow to use as a cavalry element and it's too fast to use as an infantry element." She bops my forehead. "Of all the niches you could've filled it had to be the most uncomfortable one."

Eyeroll. "I think you're overselling the difficulty of planning."

"A little." She laughs. "As long as you stick with the rest of the unit, we should be fine."

Interesting…"You're talking like I won't follow your orders."

"Well…you do have an established history of going off and doing your own thing." Robin says. "And I know you operate on your own agenda a lot of the time."

…Therefore we are naturally untrustworthy in terms of our role as a combat unit.

Should I consider that to be an admission of distrust? Or should I just chalk it up as my bullshit paranoia acting up and move on?

_The answer should be pretty obvious._

…

[3rd Person Camera, Elsewhere]

…

A squadron of four Wyvern Knights was busy chasing down a Pegasus Knight in the crisp, clear blue Valmese sky.

Actually, they weren't really _chasing, _per se. The Pegasus Knight was obviously not flying at their maximum speed, and though the Wyverns were entirely capable of simply rushing in and cutting the Pegasus off, they were given orders to simply tail the Knight instead.

One of the Wyvern Knights isn't too pleased with that order. "This is stupid. We can just kill them right now." She grumbles to her steed. "Look at them! Their rider's injured, too."

Her Wyvern growls in agreement.

…

"Did they leave yet?" Halloween Two asks tiredly.

Halloween One just turns her head a little. "Nope; that squadron of four is still shadowing us."

"Can you get them to give up?" Two pats her Pegasus to reassure her mount.

One shakes her head. "Not without ammo." She gave her right arm a glare. "…among other things. Any contact yet?"

Two taps her radio to check and waits for a response. "Nothing." She stares ahead at the approaching coastline. "We'll be able to get a better view if we skip north when we hit the water."

"Think they'll be dumb enough to fall for it if we do?" One braces the Thor between her leg and the Pegasus. She then tears off the reddened cloth wrapped around her right shoulder, wraps it around some straw stuck in the Pegasus's rigging, and then jams it into the Thor's loader. "Also, think this is going to work?"

Halloween Two shakes her head despite the situation. "Boss is gonna kill you if you break that."

"Not if I kill all of us first." One says cheerily. "Let me know when you're ready to maneuver, ok?"

…

The Valmese Wyvern captain saw the Pegasus Knights head to the coastline, as expected. He raises his lance and signals to his squadron to tighten formation and climb higher.

_Why are we climbing? _The Wyvern Knight Lady wonders. _Let's just get down there and murder them already. _She signals her intent to attack by having her Wyvern bank left and right.

_That's not why we're here. _The Captain signals a negative. _We're tracing them to see where their base is._

The Knight Lady grumbles at this some more, but she stays in formation.

_We hit their camp two nights ago and completely shattered their chain of command. _The Captain recalls._ So where are these girls going?_

The flight of Wyverns continues to tail the Pegasus Knight past the coastline and cross into the ocean.

…

"Contact!" Halloween Two suddenly yells, relieved at the buzzing in her ear. "Hibiki, this is Halloween Two, do you copy?"

_Technically that's the sign that her radio's in need of maintenance, but eh._

"Halloween, this is Destroyer Hibiki; what's your situation?"

"We are in urgent need of repair and have chasers on our tail."

There was a pause. "Repair?"

'Repair' happens to be the keyword for 'we're hurt pretty bad and need to cry for a few hours.' Or something to that effect.

"Affirmative." Two runs the checklist for her Cruise Engines quickly, mentally crossing her fingers and hoping that they'll be as effective as she needed them to be.

"Roger that, we are at rendezvous point Theta; approach when ready."

_Theta? _Halloween Two frowns. _So they never moved since we dove inland? _"Roger." She turns off her radio. "We're gonna go full afterburners in five."

"About time." Halloween One aims her Thor at the ocean surface. "Five…four…"

Right as she reached 'one' Halloween Two dove straight to the water. A split second later, Halloween One fired her Thor into the ocean surface straight behind them.

…

"Did they crash?" The Valmese captain can't help but ask when he saw the plume of water follow after the rapid loss of altitude of the Pegasus Knight. "Their rider's wounds couldn't have been that severe…" He signals for his squadron to follow him down to get a closer look.

As they helpfully obscured themselves by willingly going lower, Halloween Two engages her afterburners (hoping that the loud 'clunk' she heard was a mistake) and turns to run north.

When the water plume cleared, the captain saw the telltale trail of orange particles at the edge of his vision. _That explains it. _He smirks slightly and signals for his flight to climb and slow down.

"Why are we slowing down?!" The Wyvern Lady demands. "We can chase them down right now!"

The captain frowned at the possible-descendant-of-Minerva from Macedon. "They can fly at our top speed. Our objective is to find their base, not to eliminate their flight."

"So we're just going to chase at our leisure again?" One of the other NPCs laughed. "Sounds good to me."

"I know what you're thinking." The captain cut across the Wyvern Lady before she could reply. "You have your order. Follow it."

She grumbles but does so.

…

The Halloween Squadron, after some time of flight, eventually sighted the hull of the Destroyer Hibiki.

"Halloween, we see you." The Captain of the Hibiki calls into his radio. "What's your situation?"

"Hibiki, we're coming in hot." Halloween Two pants. "Clear the deck."

_Hot? _The Captain blinks in surprise. "Got it. Clear the deck!"

Normally, the Halloween Squadron is the only squadron that consistently requires either the Enterprise's catapult or a long runway for takeoff. If necessary, all squadrons except them can use their cruise engines at full power to do short or vertical takeoffs, depending on their loadout.

When it comes to landing, all squadrons except the Halloween can land normally (for Pegasi, anyway). The Halloween Squadron need a runway to land properly, as the impact of a short landing will otherwise break the legs of their mount.

Thus, it's a bit of a rarity to see the Halloween squadron attempting to land on the Destroyers without proper warning. What the Halloween squadron did was not warning, not by a long shot.

Also: 'coming in hot' in this instance means that the rider is physically incapable of making a controlled landing, and thus needs a place to carefully crash into.

...

The crew of the Hibiki saw the trail of smoke first and hurried to clear the landing space and spread the landing pad (literally bolts of cotton).

Soon enough, the Pegasus itself came into view, and the sharper eyed sailors saw the reason for that smoke. One of the cruise engines had malfunctioned and exploded, sending smoke as the combustible components burned.

In order to maintain control of the Pegasus (and being unable to detach the malfunctioning engine without getting off) Halloween Two had placed her leg between the burning hunk of metal and her beloved mount.

The sailors watched as the Halloween unit descended low and fast over their ship. Halloween Two then grabbed One by the collar and the release on the rigging. With a heave, she tore both of them down and aimed for the landing pad.

In order to better protect Halloween One's landing, Two let go of the rigging and embraced Halloween One. The rigging (with all of its burning glory) slammed into the deck and fell in a burning pile. The two girls crashed into the landing pad and rolled to a stop.

_The burning ex-cruise engines were then doused by wind mages siphoning water from the ocean. The Pegasus itself soared into the sky to circle around and land at its own leisure._

In short order, the captain of the Hibiki arrived with the entirety of the ship's healer corps at his heel. "What the hell happened?!" He demanded.

"See to her first." Halloween Two said, gesturing to One lying in the steadily reddening cotton. "Walhart happened."

"Walhart?" The captain repeats in disbelief. "Isn't he supposed to be in the capital?"

"Tell that to the asshole that hit our camp." Two sighs as a healer worked on her leg. She gestures to her Pegasus in the sky. "When she lands, fit her with some new gear. I need to see who's alive."

"With your leg like that you're not going anywhere." The healer snaps, tossing the spent healing sphere on her staff into a bag and pulling out a fresh one. "Now strip, I need to see what other injuries you're sporting."

Halloween Two was about to ask why when one of the other healers cut away Halloween One's clothing and armor straps to reveal hundreds of bleeding cuts on the girl's body.

"What in the blazes…?" The ship captain breathed. "You two flew with those kinds of wounds?"

"It couldn't be helped." Halloween Two sighed and took off her own armor. It was bloodied on the inside. "As far as we knew, Walhart was trying to capture the two of us." She gratefully took some water from one of the healers. "He sent every mage he had with wind magic at us…I think he tried to blast us out of the sky."

"As opposed to risking a direct kill with a sniper, huh?" The captain scowls. "Smart, to target the two of you like that."

"Yeah?" Halloween Two has a little laugh. "Well, they sent Wyverns after us too, so I'm pretty sure they'll be coming after this boat soon enough."

The captain thinks on this a little. "Duly noted." He motions to an aide. "Orders to the XO: Alert all hands for air to air combat." The aide salutes and heads off to the bridge. He then addresses the healers attending to the Halloween pair. "Move them to the sick bay."

"Not happening." Halloween Two says with a wry grin as her Pegasus surprises everyone by landing in the middle of the healers. "The Khans still need our help."

With surprising strength and speed, she snatches an Elixir from one of the healers and hop back onto her Pegasus.

The captain knew better than to insist otherwise, and sighed heavily. "Just come back alive, alright? We'll keep the ship clean in the meantime."

"Appreciate it." Halloween Two nods, takes a swig from the Elixir, and feeds the rest to her mount. "Ok…let's go."

…

The Valmese Captain, soaring high overhead, saw the Pegasus Knight take off from the enemy ship.

"Are we going after that?" The Wyvern Lady shouts over the wind.

"Call all!" The captain yells back. "Attack ship!"

His squadron members all nod and split to alert their respective squadrons.

_So that's the ship giving us hell for the past month. _The captain glares at the Destroyer far below him. _I don't care if I have to drown you in blood, I WILL take you down._

…

…

In a different part of the south, Lucina and Virion hides from any possible Valmese forces looking for them.

Given that they were hiding in a fairly sparse forest the Valmese forces wouldn't needed to have tried very hard, but since they were currently unharassed, it's fair to say that Valm wasn't trying very hard.

"Sir Virion, how are your wounds?" Lucina asks.

"I haven't bled this much since I last sparred with Vaike." Virion chuckles. "I'll live, fair Lucina."

Lucina sits on her stump and exercises her favorite pastime of sighing into her gloves. "How did they smell us out?"

Virion, having experienced this already, aims to stop it before it starts. "It's been two days after the fact. Let's focus on the task at hand."

Lucina was mercifully stopped before she can go into the death spiral of asking questions with no one to answer them.

"Rally the troops and return to the Hibiki. Right…thank you." She takes a calming breath.

"Of course." Virion adjusts the splint on his left leg and momentarily wished for Cherche to appear, if only to combat the awkwardness of the situation.

A rustling in the bushes alerted both of them to a newcomer, and Lucina hops to her feet with her Falchion in hand.

_Virion props himself up to a tree and readies his bow as well._

"Show yourself." Lucina says in a low but clear voice, careful not to reveal their position any more than necessary.

A long, serpentine, _massive_ bulk of purple slowly slithered into view. It had no discernable face, but definitely had the glowing risen eyes and painful-looking teeth.

"What in the hells…?" Virion breathes.

Lucina, on the other hand, was a little more informed. "You're about ten years too early, you little bastard." She seethes.

"You've seen that abomination before?" Virion asks in disbelief.

Lucina nods while adding a small metal piece to her Falchion. "It's a Risen of a decidedly animal appearance." She says. "They may not be as powerful as a Risen Manakete, but they're far more flexible in their approach towards combat." She then nicks the back of her hand with the Falchion.

Virion frowns. "What are you…?"

"Though I'm not as strong as Owain or as fast as Inigo, there are skills blessed onto me alone." Lucina smiles slightly. "So be a dear and die for me, will you?"

On cue, the little metal piece on her Falchion wreathed the blade with a cloud of orange particles. The particles then expanded to cover the sword and Lucina herself.

Then, as Virion watched, the particles condensed into a pair of wings affixed on Lucina's back and a pair of bladed arms seemingly protruding out of Lucina's shoulders.

"Form of Shiva." Lucina breathes. "Alright, you little shit. Come and get it."

Virion was pretty sure this kind of language was not usually in Lucina's dictionary.

The snakelike Risen lunges towards Lucina as if baited, and Lucina, floating on a wind shoes-like effect, dodges with ease. The snake's tail then whips around to strike her, but one of Lucina's sparkly arms move to block and the tail smacks the arm with an oddly metallic report.

"That's all you got?" Lucina growls and bolts forward. "Then show me that belly of yours so I can gut it open!"

_That is a very not-Lucina like thing to say. _Virion notes again and takes aim with his bow.

…

[Elsewhere, still]

…

Owain and Inigo, at around same time as the beginning of Lucina's engagement, had killed a Risen Serpent while still escorting their batch of civilians.

"Never thought I'd see one of these guys here." Inigo murmurs while examining the corpse. "What's going on?"

"Are those things unusual?" Nino asks. "I thought the Risen didn't have shapes in the first place."

"I can't tell if they're unusual or not." Inigo shrugs. "But for us, these things didn't make themselves commonplace until Grima had a strong presence in the area."

"Though this guy's a lot easier to kill than the ones we had to deal with." Owain says confidently.

The Risen Serpent dissolves at this point, and Owain retrieves one of his swords he had thrown into its mouth.

"What should we do with this information?" Inigo mutters. "Should we make the others aware that Serpents are appearing ten years too early?"

Owain shrugs. "Pretty sure we're the only ones operating independently still. Should we just send word to the Valmese army instead? Bet you anything the Boss will pick it up if we do."

"Don't forget Lucina." Inigo reminds him. "She has a nasty habit of going off on her own."

"Oh yeah." Owain frowns. "But she's protected by Shiva, so I imagine her to be safe."

"Shiva?" Nino frowns. She saw a gun with a similar codename in some of Ash's design plans.

_She wasn't supposed to, but curiosity got the better of her._

"The boss called it 'Awakening-Lite', though I can't fathom why." Inigo answers with a tone of slight confusion. "Apparently it's something that works only with Lucina's blood."

"Huh." Nino had no idea what that meant, so she changed gears. "Why was this guy a snake?"

"Supposedly, it's a Risen created with an animal component." Inigo answers, and upon seeing Nino's look of continued confusion shrugged. "If Laurent were here he'd be able to give a better explanation."

"The Vile Dark Magic of our foes grows ever stronger." Owain narrated in his Owainian voice. "It would be expedient for us to give warning to our comrades lest they become too much."

"What he said." Inigo adds with a grin, just to steal the last word from Owain, much to the latter boy's annoyance. "Can you go, Nino?"

Nino blinks in surprise. "Go where?"

"Go to where the shepherds are; I imagine Lucina or Ash would be able to make better use of this information than we can." Inigo explains.

_Lucina isn't with the main army though. _Nino reminds herself. "Do you know where they would be?"

"They should be approaching the Valmese Gate at around now." Owain thinks. "Got the map?"

Nino pulls out the map the three had been using. "I'm a little concerned about how Valm has a Gate large enough to feature on a map." She mutters.

_The gate was the only feature marked on the map but it certainly wasn't nearly as big as that kind of information would imply._

"We'll continue to escort these guys to the allied port." Owain says with a grin, referring to the band of civilians they were protecting. "So go ahead and rejoin your main army."

"Uh…" On one hand, Nino would very much like to rejoin the main army, on the other, she wasn't exactly fond of leaving work unfinished.

Thus she came to a (strange) compromise. Nino took out a small bottle of ink and some blank paper. She then quickly made a copy of the map in her hand through some very inventive use of wind magic.

_Let's remember she's the head of Stars, and thus the strongest normal (kinda) mage in the Phoenix outfit._

"That's pretty cool." Inigo muses.

Nino hands him the original copy with a small smile. "Don't get lost."

Without waiting for Inigo's response, Nino bolts off in the general direction of the Valm Gate.

"Do you think she knew what I was going to say?" Inigo says with a slightly sad smile.

"We all knew what you were going to say." Owain replies with a not-very-reassuring pat on his friend's shoulder. "Now come, we have an escort mission to finish."

…

…

[1st Person Camera]

…

…

Hooo boy what the hell did we walk into here.

After three days of travelling (yay for wonderful weather) we arrived at the Valm Gate.

The Valm Gate, incidentally, is the site of a major battle.

_A major battle that's about to happen?_

A major battle that's _currently_ _happening_.

"Who're the major players here?" I ask Robin.

Robin, Fredrick, Chrom, and I are out on recon. We're hiding behind a small hill and peering at the carnage at the foot of the gate through our spyglasses (I brought extra).

"Those Great Knights and Valkryies look Valmese." Robin mutters. "The ground troops they're fighting are irregulars…rebels?" She frowns, because the rebs are not being systematically chewed through. "Where'd the rebels get such high quality troops?"

Maybe they're capitalizing on something? "Do you see Walhart?"

"I don't know." Robin replies blandly. "But I do see a massive cavalryman in red armor and a helmet made with exceedingly bad taste."

Sounds like Walhart.

"He's at the rear of their formation." Fredrick observes. "I heard he was more of a frontline leader."

I spy with my little eye…wow Walhart is huge. Also yes, he and his massive fuckoff axe are…wait, let's step back for a second.

The field in front of the Gate is a shockingly flat set of plains. There are no forts in sight, but there is a series of palisades acting as a barrier between the Valmese infantry (which are not in play) and the battlefield.

On the battlefield itself is (or what I'm going to assume is) the bulk of Valm's heaviest mounted knights, stomping the bejesus out of the on-foot Warriors, Swordmasters, and Heroes of the rebel forces.

Notably, the rebels don't seem to have a defensive fallback line of any kind, and the forces currently engaged in battle seems to be…er, well, their entire force.

_All or nothing to the extreme, it seems._

Valm, on the other hand, has Armored Knights and Generals on reserve, along with Sages and Snipers. It doesn't look like they have a lot of them; maybe two hundred men total, but…reserves are reserves, y'know? Plus they seem to be reasonably high level units too.

Walhart himself is guarding the Gate into Valm proper, along with a bodyguard team of a handful of Great Knights. They don't seem to be in the mood to move.

In the sky…is a single Gryphon Knight and a group of around five Wyvern Knights…I'm guessing they're Wyvern Lords simply by virtue of how few of them there are. Makes me wonder if there are more reserves hiding behind the gate.

Also, that Gryphon Knight needs to be dragged down and killed before he becomes more than just a recurring background element.

_Real life isn't plot, you know? It could've been multiple knights flying rotations._

Could be, might be. Either way, that speed and the innate combat ability of the Gryphon itself means the sooner we stop it from jumping into battle at a crucial moment, the better.

We can sic Noire on it when we get the chance, I suppose.

"The situation is not exactly pleasant, but I think we can manage our regicide at this point." Robin huffs. "Now c'mon, we need to move before the rebels lose all their steam."

"Right." Chrom nods in full agreement, and we return to our main forces.

…

[One rapid briefing later]

…

This is such a weird plan.

Our faster forces (Fredrick, Stahl, Severa, Panne, Yarne, Maribelle, Me) will deploy to directly assist the rebel forces.

"You don't have to turn the tide, just make sure the rebels don't buckle." Robin had advised. "Fredrick will have local command of the operation."

"Yes ma'am." Fredrick salutes.

_Why us?_

Our airman's rifle has shit penetration power against armor and our close quarters combat isn't too good, so we're on anti-Valkryie duty.

Also (and this is why Severa's coming along) our wind shoes gives us the agility to be about as fast as cavalry, so we (both of us) can keep up with Fredrick's maneuvering while still having the freedom of maneuverability as foot soldiers.

The slower ground forces (everyone else except the fliers) will advance under a Screen Cover to circle around and engage Walhart directly.

_Increasing the pressure the rebels can put on the Valmese force means that Robin's main attack will go smoother, too._

Robin's banking on the element of surprise to help Chrom's engage with the big man and everyone else's engagement with the rest of their forces.

The air force (Cherche, Sumia, Cordelia, Gerome, Cynthia) will stay in reserve until the main force has engaged, and then they will tie down the enemy air force and strike at any exposed Valmese units. Robin's leery about deploying them too early, as the Valm Snipers are simply sitting back and would have no problems sniping them without some kind of distraction.

"So clean-up duty as usual." Cynthia said with an exaggerated huff. "Boooring."

_That earned her a bop to the head from Laurent, of all people._

And so we're off to fight a chapter 20(?) that's already happening without us.

…Fun.

_Put more spirit into it._

Ugh. Fine.

REDWAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAALL!

.

.

.

{ === + === }

Author Notes: We're coming up to the home stretch now! Just another year!

…if this story actually takes me another year I'm going to cry.

I want to move on to Fates _so hard_. But no, I had to decide to do a sequel and be inflexible…

Boo hoo hoo (etc.)

((This particular chapter was also done piecemeal, so point out mistakes.))


End file.
